The development of personal epistemology: Dimensions, disciplinary differences, and instructional practices.

Abstract

Epistemology is an area of philosophy concerned with the nature and justification of human knowledge. A growing area of interest for psychologists and educators is that of epistemological development and epistemological beliefs: how individuals come to know, the theories and beliefs they hold about knowing, and the manner in which such epistemological premises are a part of and an influence on the cognitive processes of thinking and reasoning. This dissertation provides a review of the literature on personal epistemology, proposes a set of issues for further work, and presents two empirical studies, one quantitative and one qualitative, that address three central issues: (1) the dimensionality of epistemological theories; (2) whether epistemological theories differ by discipline; and (3) how college students interpret instructional practices epistemologically. The proposed dimensions of personal epistemology, as suggested across the literature, are certainty of knowledge, simplicity of knowledge, source of knowledge, and justification for knowing. The first study examines these with a version of the Schommer epistemological beliefs questionnaire, a written adaptation of the reflective judgment interview, and a new discipline-focused instrument; participants were 326 first-year college students. This study presents evidence that there is an underlying dimensionality to epistemological theories that cuts across disciplinary domains, but that students, at least by the first year of college, discriminate as to how these theories differ by discipline. As such, this contradicts previous findings suggesting that epistemological beliefs are domain independent. The second study combines observations of introductory college classes in psychology and chemistry with interviews of 25 first-year students enrolled in both courses and provides a phenomenological perspective on the continuum of beliefs for each of the four dimensions of epistemological theories. This study also confirms the earlier findings regarding disciplinary differences in beliefs and explores how students interpret instructional practices epistemologically as they relate to each of the four dimensions. It appears that instructional practices are interpreted through the lens of students' epistemological assumptions, but that these perspectives are evolving and instructors have the power to influence them.