Differences in scientific epistemic beliefs among regions and school types in Turkey

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to reveal differences in students’ scientific epistemic beliefs between geographic regions and school type in Turkey. The geographic regions were selected as 12 NUTS-1 regions and school types were general secondary schools and vocational and technical secondary schools. The reason why this study was deemed necessary was that educational inequalities in Turkey seem to be decreasing the well-being of the citizens and the full economic potential of the country. Attention is especially drawn to science education because we live in the information age where ability in producing knowledge in science and technology is highly rewarded. Moreover, science education in Turkey has rooms for development. The data was pooled from the 2015 PISA cycle (which included 6 4-point Likert scale items on scientific epistemic beliefs), and a two-way ANOVA was carried out via SPSS to examine mean differences with respect to regions and schools, and also their interactions. Concerning significant results were revealed for the Northeast Anatolia Region’s vocational and technical secondary students. Significant between school differences also seem to require more attention. However, practical significance of the study was small.