European first-year university students accept evolution but lack substantial knowledge about it: a standardized European cross-country assessment

Evolution: Education and Outreach

Ioan Tăușan¹  Andrea Möller²  Paulo G. Mota³  Dragana D. Cvetković⁴  Andra Meneganzin⁵  Telmo Pievani⁵  Jana Fančovičová⁶  Emilie Demarsy⁷  Donato A. Grasso⁸  Anna E. Uitto⁹  Maria Petersson^1,10  Niklas Gericke^1,11  Uroš B. Savković^1,12  Mirko S. Đorđević^1,12  Ádám Z. Lendvai^1,13  Zoltán Németh^1,13  Máté Varga^1,14  Liudmyla Dubchak^1,15  Anxela Bugallo-Rodriguez^1,16  Lucia Vazquez-Ben^1,16  Athanasios Mogias^1,17  Bento Filipe Barreiras Pinto Cavadas^1,18  Alexandru N. Stermin^1,19  Radka M. Dvořáková^2,20  Nicoleta Adriana Geamănă^2,21  Rianne Pinxten^2,22  Pedro Cardia^2,23  Inmaculada Yruela^2,24  Péter László Pap^2,25  Enrique Viguera^2,26  Barbara Pietrzak^2,27  Albena Vutsova^2,28  Juris Porozovs^2,29  Gregor Torkar^3,30  Umran Betul Cebesoy^3,31  Lütfullah Türkmen^3,31  Mirna Varga^3,32  Alexander Bergmann^3,33  Andrej Sorgo^3,34  Slavica Tutnjević^3,35  Alma Pobric^3,36  Giulia Realdon^3,37  Katarzyna Ożańska-Ponikwia^3,38  Momir Futo^3,39  Mathieu Sicard^4,40  Anna Beniermann^4,41  Dittmar Graf^4,42  Paul Kuschmierz^4,42  Jelle Zandveld^4,43  Szymon M. Drobniak^4,44  Silvia Paolucci^4,45  Corinne Fortin^4,46  Mircea T. Sofonea^4,47  Tuomas Aivelo^4,48  Yamama Naciri^4,49  Evangelia Mavrikaki^5,50  Gustav Bohlin^5,51  Xana Sá-Pinto^5,52  Constantinos Venetis^5,53  Lisa Christine Virtbauer^5,54  Justyna Berniak-Woźny^5,55 

[1] Applied Ecology Research Centre, Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu, Sibiu, Romania;Austrian Educational Competence Centre of Biology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria;CIBIO, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal;Chair of Genetics and Evolution, Faculty of Biology, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia;Department of Biology (DiBio), University of Padua, Padua, Italy;Department of Biology, Faculty of Education, Trnava University, Trnava, Slovakia;Department of Botany and Plant Biology, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland;Department of Chemistry, Life Sciences and Environmental Sustainability, University of Parma, Parma, Italy;Department of Education, Faculty of Educational Sciences, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland;Department of Educational Studies, Karlstad University, Karlstad, Sweden;Department of Environmental and Life Sciences, Karlstad University, Karlstad, Sweden;Department of Evolutionary Biology, Institute for Biological Research “Siniša Stanković” - National Institute of Republic of Serbia, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia;Department of Evolutionary Zoology and Human Biology, University of Debrecen, Debrecen, Hungary;Department of Genetics, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary;Department of Parliamentarism and Political Management, National Academy for Public Administration Under the President of Ukraine, Kyiv, Ukraine;Department of Pedagogy and Didactics, University of A Coruña, A Coruña, Spain;Department of Primary Education, Democritus University of Thrace, Alexandroupolis, Greece;Department of Science and Mathematics, Polytechnic Institute of Santarém/School of Education, Santarém, Portugal;Department of Taxonomy and Ecology, Babeș-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania;Department of Teaching and Didactics of Biology, Charles University, Praha, Czech Republic;Department/Research Center in Systems Ecology and Sustainability, University of Bucharest, Bucharest, Romania;Didactica Research Unit, Faculty of Social Sciences & Behavioural Ecology & Ecophysiology Group, Department of Biology, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium;Escola Superior de Educação, Politécnico do Porto, Porto, Portugal;Estación Experimental de Aula Dei, Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), Zaragoza, Spain;Evolutionary Ecology Group, Hungarian Department of Biology and Ecology, Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj Napoca, Romania;Facultad de Ciencias/Departamento de Biologia Celular, Genetica y Fisiologia, Universidad de Malaga, Malaga, Spain;Faculty of Biology/Institute of Functional Biology and Ecology/Department of Hydrobiology, University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland;Faculty of Economic and Business Adminstration - FEBA, Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”, Sofia, Bulgaria;Faculty of Education, Psychology and Art, University of Latvia, Riga, Latvia;Faculty of Education, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia;Faculty of Education/Department of Mathematics and Science Education, Usak University, Uşak, Turkey;Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences Osijek, University of Osijek, Osijek, Croatia;Faculty of Life Science, Department of Biology, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany;Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, University of Maribor, Maribor, Slovenia;Faculty of Philosophy, University of Banja Luka, Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina;Faculty of Science, University of Sarajevo, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina;Geology Section - UNICAMearth Group, University of Camerino, Camerino, Italy;Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Bielsko-Biala, Bielsko-Biala, Poland;Institut Ruđer Bošković/Division of Molecular Biology, Zagreb, Croatia;Institut des Sciences de l’évolution (UM, IRD, CNRS), Université de Montpellier, Montpellier, France;Institute for Biology; Teaching and Learning Research in Biology Education, Humboldt-Universität Zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany;Institute for Didactics of Biology, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, Giessen, Germany;Institute of Education Biology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands;Institute of Environmental Sciences, Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland;Laboratorio di Scienze Sperimentali, Foligno, Italy;Laboratory of Didactic André Revuz, University of Paris, Paris, France;MIVEGEC, Université de Montpellier, Montpellier, France;Organismal and Evolutionary Biology Research Program, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland;Plant Systematics and Biodiversity Laboratory, Conservatoire et Jardin Botanique de Genève & University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland;Primary Education Department, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece;Public & Science (VA), Stockholm, Sweden;Research Centre in Didactics and Technology in Teacher Training, Department of Education and Psychology, University of Aveiro, Aveiro, Portugal;School of Education, Department of Pedagogy and Primary Education, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece;School of Education, Universität Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria;University of Information Technology and Management in Rzeszów, Rzeszów, Poland;

关键词: Evolution;    Acceptance;    Knowledge;    Multilevel modeling;    Socioscientific issues;    Religious faith;    Higher education;    Europe;    Assessment;    Attitude;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12052-021-00158-8

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundInvestigations of evolution knowledge and acceptance and their relation are central to evolution education research. Ambiguous results in this field of study demonstrate a variety of measuring issues, for instance differently theorized constructs, or a lack of standardized methods, especially for cross-country comparisons. In particular, meaningful comparisons across European countries, with their varying cultural backgrounds and education systems, are rare, often include only few countries, and lack standardization. To address these deficits, we conducted a standardized European survey, on 9200 first-year university students in 26 European countries utilizing a validated, comprehensive questionnaire, the “Evolution Education Questionnaire”, to assess evolution acceptance and knowledge, as well as influencing factors on evolution acceptance.ResultsWe found that, despite European countries’ different cultural backgrounds and education systems, European first-year university students generally accept evolution. At the same time, they lack substantial knowledge about it, even if they are enrolled in a biology-related study program. Additionally, we developed a multilevel-model that determines religious faith as the main influencing factor in accepting evolution. According to our model, knowledge about evolution and interest in biological topics also increase acceptance of evolution, but to a much lesser extent than religious faith. The effect of age and sex, as well as the country’s affiliation, students’ denomination, and whether or not a student is enrolled in a biology-related university program, is negligible.ConclusionsOur findings indicate that, despite all their differences, most of the European education systems for upper secondary education lead to acceptance of evolution at least in university students. It appears that, at least in this sample, the differences in knowledge between countries reflect neither the extent to which school curricula cover evolutionary biology nor the percentage of biology-related students in the country samples. Future studies should investigate the role of different European school curricula, identify particularly problematic or underrepresented evolutionary concepts in biology education, and analyze the role of religious faith when teaching evolution.

【 授权许可】

CC BY