Epistemological and Instructional Assumptions of College Teachers (original) (raw)

Teachers' views of education, their ptudents, and their disciplines were assessed based on interviews with 20 faculty members from a small-libera1 arts college. The interviews were content.analyzed, and the relationships between epistemdlogical beliefs, course objectives, and views of student difficulties (e.g., . skill deficiencies, personality) were e*amined. Ipterview protocols were coded by two rates, and the epistemological assumptions were 4 categorized, folloving the Perry scheme, as dualistic, multiplistic, relativpstic, or dommitted. Educational objectives were coded'as knowledge of facts, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, or evaluation. Disciplknary division wes,found to bA related to. educational objectives,, while epistemological assumptions were found to be related.to4perceptions of student difficulty. Teachers attributions of the causes for student difficulties were as.follows: effort (30 petcent), personality characteridtics (30 percent), talent, (40 percent), dtudy skillis (55 percent), and concreteness (45 percent). TeAchers iTho viewed the wqrld in terms of absolute truths, attributed the difficulties of their students to the relatively stable causes of,telent and personality. (SW) Researcfi Association 91.*