Decoding the Disciplines: An Approach to Scientific Thinking

Abstract

The Decoding the Disciplines methodology aims to teach students to think like experts in discipline-specific tasks. The central aspect of the methodology is to identify a bottleneck in the course content: a particular topic that a substantial number of students struggle to master. The current study compared the efficacy of standard lecture and readings (Control) to the Decoding the Disciplines methodology in teaching Introductory Psychology students about the scientific process. Relative to the Control group (N = 45), students taught using the Decoding the Disciplines methodology (N = 46) created better hypotheses and operational definitions and correctly identified more variables. These results suggest that using the Decoding the Discipline methodology may facilitate student learning about scientific inquiry.

Bibliographic data

Pinnow, E. (2016). Decoding the Disciplines: An Approach to Scientific Thinking. Psychology Learning & Teaching, 15(1), 94-101.

External source

https://doi.org/10.1177/1475725716637484