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Relevant CAT: Attitude Survey
Discipline: All
Description:
The Views on Science-Technology-Society (VOSTS) survey is a tool that can help describe how your students view the social nature of science and how science is conducted. The VOSTS asks students about:
- what science and technology are,
- how society influences science and technology,
- how science and technology influences society,
- how science as taught in school influences society,
- what characterizes scientists,
- how scientific knowledge comes about, and
- the nature of scientific knowledge.
The VOSTS has 114 multiple-choice questions and the multiple-choice responses are grounded in the literature and on an extended process of analyzing student comments, creating potential responses, and verifying those comments with students. (The question in the figure below is illustrative of the kinds of questions VOSTS asks.) The validity of the survey arises from its development, which is grounded in student views (Aikenhead & Ryan, 1992).
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Actual VOSTS question
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Defining science is difficult because science is complex and does many things. But MAINLY science is:
Your position, basically: (Please read from A to K, and then choose one)
- a study of fields such as biology, chemistry, and physics
- a body of knowledge, such as principles, laws and theories, which explain the world around us (matter, energy and life)
- exploring the unknown and discovering new things about our world and universe and how they work
- carrying out experiments to solve problems of interest about the world around us
- inventing or designing things (for example, artificial hearts, computers, space vehicles)
- finding and using knowledge to make this world a better place to live in (for example, curing diseases, solving pollution and improving agriculture)
- an organization of people (called scientists) who have ideas and techniques for discovering new knowledge
- No one can define science
- I don't understand
- I don't know enough about this subject to make a choice
- None of these choices fits my basic veiwpoint
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Tool:
Authors:
Glen Aikenhead (College of Education, University of Saskatchewan)
Alan Ryan (College of Education, University of Saskatchewan)
Reg Fleming (College of Education, University of Saskatchewan).
Selected References:
Aikenhead, G. (1997). Student views on the influence of culture on science. International Journal of Science Education, 19, 419-428.
Aikenhead, G., & Ryan, A. (1992). The development of a new instrument: 'Views on Science-Technology-Society' (VOSTS). Science Education, 76, 477-492.
Ryan, A., & Aikenhead, G. (1992). Students' preconceptions about the epistemology of science. Science Education, 76, 559-580.
Aikenhead, G. (1988). An analysis of four ways of assessing student beliefs about STS topics. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 25, 607-629.
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