Prof. Jodie Jenkins and Dr. Andrea Gauthier

Molecular Concepts Adaptive Assessment (MCAA) Characterizes Undergraduate Misconceptions about Molecular Emergence

In the new paper in  CBE Life Sciences Education, recent PhD graduate Andrea Gauthier (Prof. Jodie Jenkinson) discusses the results of two experiments assessing undergraduate students' beliefs about the random nature of molecular environments.

Undergraduates are taught early-on in their studies that proteins and other molecules inside of cells are in constant random motion. However, students typically think of cells as being tiny, efficient machines, and have difficulty reconciling this with the concept of randomness. Subsequently they tend to develop deeply ingrained misconceptions in order to resolve these two conflicting ideas. For instance, they intuit that proteins move around randomly until they are sent a message from the nucleus to perform a function, or that two complementary proteins are able to “sense” each other (e.g. through magnetic attraction) over long distances, attributing a level of agency to their movements. Through focus groups and pilot testing, we developed the Molecular Concepts Adaptive Assessment (MCAA)—an online multiple-choice test that dynamically adapts to the responses of students—to evaluate and better characterize misconceptions regarding the emergent nature of cellular environments; their confidence in each answer was also measured. We implemented the MCAA in first-, second-, and third-year courses over three consecutive years and found that A) advanced learners held just as many misconceptions as novice learners and that B) their confidence in their misconceptions actually increased over time. Our findings suggest that the way in which we teach cell biology does not adequately address students’ preconceived notions of molecular movement, and that the visuals used to communicate molecular subject matter should be carefully crafted to avoid reinforcing misconceptions.

Congrats to Andrea Gauthier (Prof. Jodie Jenkinson)!

 

 

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