Psychological skills, academic achievement and…swimming

Keith S. Taber

'Psychological Skills in Relation to Academic Achievement through Swimming Context'

Original image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay

I was intrigued by the title of an article I saw in a notification: "Psychological Skills in Relation to Academic Achievement through Swimming Context". In part, it was the 'swimming context' – despite never having been very athletic or sporty (which is not to say I did not enjoy sports, just that I was never particularly good at any), I have always been a regular and enthusiastic swimmer. Not a good swimmer, mind (too splashy, too easily veering off-line) – but an enthusiastic one. But I was also intrigued by the triad of psychological skills, academic achievement, and swimming.

Perhaps I had visions of students' psychological skills being tested in relation to their academic achievement as they pounded up and down the pool. So, I was tempted to follow this up.

Investigating psychological skills and academic achievement

The abstract of the paper by Bayyat and colleagues reported three aims for their study:

"This study aimed to investigate:

(1) the level of psychological skills among students enrolled in swimming courses at the Physical Education faculties in the Jordanian Universities.

(2) the relation between their psychological skills and academic achievement.

(3) the differences in these psychological skills according to gender."

Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535

The article was published in a journal called 'Psychology and Education', which, its publishers* suggest is "a quality journal devoted to basic research, theory, and techniques and arts of practice in the general field of psychology and education".

A peer reviewed journal

The peer review policy reports this is a double-blind peer-reviewed journal. This means other academics have critiqued and evaluated a submission prior to its being accepted for publication. Peer review is a necessary (but not sufficient) condition for high quality research journals.

Journals with high standards use expert peer reviewers, and the editors use their reports to both reject low-quality submissions, and to seek to improve high-quality submissions by providing feedback to authors about points that are not clear, any missing information, incomplete chains of argumentation, and so forth. In the best journals editors only accept submissions after reviewers' criticisms have been addressed to the satisfaction of reviewers (or authors have made persuasive arguments for why some criticism does not need addressing).

(Read about peer review)

The authors here report that

"The statistical analysis results revealed an average level of psychological skills, significant differences in psychological skills level in favor of female students, A students and JU[**], and significant positive relation between psychological skills and academic achievement."
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535

Rewriting slightly it seems that, according to this study:

the students in the study had average levels of psychological skills;
the female students have higher levels of psychological skills than their male peers;
and that there was some kind of positive correlation between psychological
skills and academic achievement;

Anyone reading a research paper critically asks themselves questions such as

'what do they mean by that?';
'how did they measure that?;
'how did they reach that conclusion?'; and
'who does this apply to?'

Females are better – but can we generalise?

In this study it was reported that

"By comparing psychological skills between male and female participants, results revealed significant differences in favor [sic] of female participants"
"All psychological skills' dimensions of female participants were significant in favor [sic] of females compared to their male peers. They were more focused, concentrated, confident, motivated to achieve their goals, and sought to manage their stress."
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4541, 4545

"It's our superior psychological skills that make us this good!" (Image by CristianoCavina from Pixabay)

A pedant (such as the present author) might wonder if "psychological skills' dimensions of female participants" [cf. psychological skills' dimensions of male participants?] would not be inherently likely to be in favour of females , but it is clear from the paper that this is intended to refer to the finding that females (as a group) got significantly higher ratings than males (as a group) on the measures of 'psychological skills'.

If we for the moment (but please read on below…) accept these findings as valid, an obvious question is the extent to which these results might generalise beyond the study. That is, to what extent would these findings being true for the participants of this study imply the same thing would be found more widely (e.g., among all students in Jordanian Universities? among all university students? Among all adult Jordanians? among all humans?)

Statistical generalisation (From Taber, 2019)

Two key concepts here are the population and the sample. The population is the group that we wish our study to be about (e.g., chemistry teachers in English schools, 11-year olds in New South Wales…), and the sample is the group who actually provide data. In order to generalise to the population from the sample it is important that the sample is large enough and representative of the population (which of course may be quite difficult to ascertain).

(Read about sampling in research)

(Read about generalisation)

In this study the reader is told that "The population of this study was undergraduate male and female students attending both intermediate and advanced swimming courses" (Bayyat et al., 2021: 4536). Taken at face value this might raise the question of why a sample was drawn exclusively from Jordan – unless of course this is the only national context where students attend intermediate or advanced swimming courses. *** However, it was immediately clarified that "They consisted of (n= 314) students enrolled at the schools of Sport Sciences at three state universities". That is, the population was actually undergraduate male and female students from schools of Sport Sciences at three Jordanian state universities attending both intermediate and advanced swimming courses.

"The Participants were an opportunity sample of 260 students" (Bayyat et al., 2021: 4536). So in terms of sample size, 260, the sample made up most of the population – almost 83%. This is in contrast to many educational studies where the samples may necessarily only reflect a small proportion of the population. In general, representatives of a sample is more important than size as skew in the sample undermines statistical generalisations (whereas size, for a representative sample, influences the magnitude of the likely error ****) – but a reader is likely to feel that when over four-fifths of the population were sampled it is less critical that a convenience sample was used.

This still does not ensure us that the results can be generalised to the population (students from schools of Sport Sciences at three Jordanian state universities attending 'both' intermediate and advanced swimming courses), but psychologically it seems quite convincing.

Ontology: What are we dealing with?

The study is only useful if it is about something that readers think is important – and it is clear what it is about. The authors tells us their study is about

Psychological Skills
Academic Achievement

which would seem to be things educators should be interested in. We do need to know however how the authors understand these constructs: what do they mean by 'a Psychological Skill' and 'Academic achievement'? Most people would probably think they have a pretty good idea what these terms might mean, but that is no assurance at all that different people would agree on this.

So, in reading this paper it is important to know what the authors themselves mean by these terms – so a reader can check they understand these terms in a sufficiently similar way.

What is academic achievement?

The authors suggest that

"academic achievement reflects the learner's accomplishment of specific goals by the end of an educational experience in a determined amount of time"
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535

This seems to be the extent of the general characterisation of this construct in the paper *****.

What are psychological skills?

The authors tell readers that

"Psychological skills (PS) are a group of skills and abilities that enhances peoples' performance and achievement…[It has been] suggested that PS includes a whole set of trainable skills including emotional control and self-confidence"
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535

For the purposes of this particular study, they

"identified the psychological skills related to the swimming context such as; leadership, emotional stability, sport achievement motivation, self-confidence, stress management, and attention"
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4536
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4536

So the relevant skills are considered to be:

leadership
emotional stability
sport achievement motivation
self-confidence
stress management
attention

I suspect that there would not be complete consensus among psychologists or people working in education over whether all of these constructs actually are 'skills'. Someone who did not consider these (or some of these) characteristics as skills would need to read the authors' claims arising from the study about 'psychological skills' accordingly (i.e., perhaps as being about something other than skills) but as the authors have been clear about their use of the term, this should not confuse or mislead readers.

Epistemology: How do we know?

Having established what is meant by 'psychological skills' and 'academic achievement' a reader would want to know how these were measured in the present study – do the authors use techniques that allow them to obtain valid and reliable measures of 'psychological skills' and 'academic achievement'?

How is academic achievement measured?

The authors inform readers that

"To calculate students' academic achievement, the instructors of the swimming courses conducted a valid and reliable assessment as a pre-midterm, midterm, and final exam throughout the semester…The assessment included performance tests and theoretical tests (paper and pencil tests) for each level"
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4538
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4538

Although the authors claim their assessment are valid and reliable, a careful reader will note that the methodology here does not match the definition of "accomplishment of specific goals by the end of an educational experience" (emphasis added)- as only the final examinations took place at the end of the programme. On that point, then, there is a lack of internal consistency in the study. This might not matter to a reader who did not think academic achievement needed to be measured at the end of a course of study.

Information on the "Academic achievement assessment tool", comprising six examinations (pre-midterm, midterm, and final examinations at each of the intermediate and advanced levels) is included as an appendix – good practice that allows a reader to interrogate the instrument.

Although this appendix is somewhat vague on precise details, it offers a surprise to someone (i.e., me) with a traditional notion of what is meant by 'academic achievement' – as both theory and practical aspects are included. Indeed, most of the marks seem to be given for practical swimming proficiency. So, the 'Intermediate swimming Pre-midterm exam' has a maximum of 20 marks available – with breast stroke leg technique and arm technique each scored out of ten marks.

The 'Advanced swimming midterm exam' is marked out of 30, with 10 marks each available for the 200m crawl (female), individual medley (female) and life guarding techniques. This seems to suggest that 20 of the 30 marks available can only be obtained by being female, but this point does not seem to be clarified. Presumably (?) male students had a different task that the authors considered equivalent.

How are psychological skills measured?

In order to measure psychological skills the authors proceeded to "to develop and validate a questionnaire" (p.4536). Designing a new instrument is a complex and challenging affair. The authors report how they

"generated a 40 items-questionnaire reflecting the psychological skills previously mentioned [leadership, emotional stability, sport achievement motivation, self-confidence, stress management, and attention] by applying both deductive and inductive methods. The items were clear, understandable, reflect the real-life experience of the study population, and not too long in structure."
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4538

So, items were written which it was thought would reflect the focal skills of interest. (Unfortunately there are no details of what the authors mean by "applying both deductive and inductive methods" to generate the items.) Validity was assured by asking a panel of people considered to have expertise to critique the items:

"the scale was reviewed and assessed by eight qualified expert judges from different related fields (sport psychology, swimming, teaching methodology, scientific research methodology, and kinesiology). They were asked to give their opinion of content representation of the suggested PS [psychological skills], their relatedness, clarity, and structure of items. According to the judges' reviews, we omitted both leadership and emotional stability domains, in addition to several items throughout the questionnaire. Other items were rephrased, and some items were added. Again, the scale was reviewed by four judges, who agreed on 80% of the items."

So, construct validity was a kind of face validity, in that people considered to be experts thought the final set of items would elicit the constructs intended, but there was no attempt to see if responses correlated in any way with any actual measurements of the 'skills'.

Readers of the paper wondering if they should be convinced by the study would need to judge if the expert panel had the right specialisms to evaluate scale items for 'psychological skills',and might find some of the areas of expertise (i.e.,

sport psychology
swimming
teaching methodology
scientific research methodology
kinesiology)

more relevant than others:

Self-reports

If respondents responded honestly, their responses would have reflected their own estimates of their 'skills' – at least to the extent that their interpretation of the items matched that of the experts. (That is, there was no attempt to investigate how members of the population of interest would understand what was meant by the items.)

Here are some examples of the items in the instrument:

Construct ('psychological skill')	Example item
self-confidence	I manage my time effectively while in class
sports motivation achievement	I do my best to control everything related to swimming lessons.
attention	I can pay attention and focus on different places in the pool while carrying out swimming tasks
stress-management	I am not afraid to perform any difficult swimming skill, no matter what

Examples of statements students were asked to rate in order to measure their 'psychological skills' (source: Bayyat et al., 2021: 4539-4541)

Analysis of data

The authors report various analyses of their data, that lead to the conclusions they reach. If a critical reader was convinced about matters so far, they would still need to beleive that the analyses undertaken were

appropriate, and
completed competently, and
correctly interpreted.

Drawing conclusions

However, as a reader I personally would have too many quibbles with the conceptualisation and design of instrumentation to consider the analysis in much detail.

To my mind, at least, the measure of 'academic achievement' seems to be largely an evaluation of swimming skills. They are obviously important in a swimming course, but I do not consider this a valid measure of academic achievement. That is not a question of suggesting academic achievement is better or more important than practical or athletic achievements, but it is surely something different (akin to me claiming to have excellent sporting achievement on the basis of holding a PhD in education).

The measure of psychological skills does not convince me either. I am not sure some of the focal constructs can really be called 'skills' (self-confidence? motivation?), but even if they were, there is no attempt to directly measure skill. At best, the questionnaire offers self-reports of how students perceive (or perhaps wish to be seen as perceiving) their characteristics.

It is quite common in research to see the term 'questionnaire' used for an instrument that is intended to test knowledge or skill – but questionnaires are not the right kind of instrument for that job.

(Read about questionnaires)

Significant positive relation between psychological skills and academic achievement?

So, I do not think this methodology would allow anyone to find a "significant positive relation between psychological skills and academic achievement" – only a relationship between students self-ratings on some psychological characteristics and swimming achievement. (That may reflect an interesting research question, and could perhaps be a suitable basis for a study, but is not what this study claims to be about.)

Significant differences in psychological skills level in favor of female students?

In a similar way, although it is interesting that females tended to score higher on the questionnaire scales, this shows they had higher self-ratings on average, and tells us nothing about their actual skills.

It may be that the students have great insight into these constructs and their own characteristics and so make very accurate ratings on these scales – but with absolutely no evidential basis for thinking this there are no grounds for making such a claim.

An alternative interpretation of the results is that on average the male students under-rate their 'skills' compared to their female peers. That is the 'skills' could be much the same across gender, but there might be a gender-based difference in perception. (I am not suggesting that is the case, but the evidence presented in the paper can be explained just as well by that possibility.)

An average level of psychological skills?

Finally, we might ask what is meant by

"The statistical analysis results revealed an average level of psychological skills…"
"Results of this study revealed that the participants acquired all four psychological skills at a moderate level."
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535, 4545

Even leaving aside that what is being measured is something other than psychological skills, it is hard to see how these statements can be justified. This was the first administration of a new instrument being applied to a sample of a very specific population.

The paper reports standard deviations for the ratings on the items in the questionnaire, so – as would be expected – there were distributions of results: spreads with different students giving different ratings. Within the sample tested, some of the students will have given higher than median ratings on an item, some will have given lower than median ratings – although on average the ratings for that particular item would have been – average for this sample (that is, by definition!) So, assuming this claim (of average/moderate levels of psychological skills) was not meant as a tautology, the authors might seem to be suggesting that the ratings given on this administration of the instrument align with what would be typically obtained, that is from across other administrations.

That is, the authors seem to be suggesting that the ratings given on this administration of the instrument align with what they expect would be typically obtained from across other administrations. Of course they have absolutely no way of knowing that is the case without collecting data from samples of other populations.

What the authors actually seem to be basing these claims (of average/moderate levels of psychological skills) on is that the average responses on these scales did not give a very high or very low rating in terms of the raw scale. Yet, with absolutely no reference data for how other groups of people might respond on the same instrument that offers little useful information. At best, it suggests something welcome about the instrument itself (ideally one would wish items to elicit a spread of responses, rather than having most responses rated very high or very low) but nothing about the students sampled.

On this point the authors seem to be treating the scale as calibrated in terms of some nominal standard (e.g. 'a rating of 3-4 would be the norm'), when there is no inherent interpretation of particular ratings of items in such a scale that can just be assumed – rather this would be a matter that would need to be explored empirically.

The research paper as an argument

The research paper is a very specific genre of writing. It is an argument for new knowledge claims. The conclusions of the paper rest on a chain of argument that starts with the conceptualisation of the study and moves through research design, data collection, analysis, and interpretation. As a reader, any link in the argument chain that is not convincing potentially invalidates the knowledge claim(s) being made. Thus the standards expected for research papers are very high.

In sum then, this was an intriguing study, but did not convince me (even if it apparently convinced the peer reviewers and editor of Psychology and Education). I am not sure it was really about psychological skills or, academic achievement

…but at least it was clearly set in the context of swimming.

Work cited:

Bayyat, M. M., Orabi, S. M., Al-Tarawneh, A. D., Alleimon, S. M., & Abaza, S. N. (2021). Psychological Skills in Relation to Academic Achievement through Swimming Context. Psychology and Education, 58(5), 4535-4551.

Taber, K. S. (2019). Experimental research into teaching innovations: responding to methodological and ethical challenges. Studies in Science Education, 55(1), 69-119. doi:10.1080/03057267.2019.1658058 [Download manuscript version]

* Despite searching the different sections of the journal site, I was unable to find who publishes the journal. However, searching outside the site I found a record of the publisher of this journal being 'Auricle Technologies, Pvt., Ltd'.

** It transpired later in the paper that 'JU' referred to students at the University of Jordan: one of three universities involved in the study.

*** I think literally this means those who participated in the study were students attending both an intermediate swimming course and an advanced swimming course – but I read this to mean those who participated in the study were students attending either an intermediate or advanced swimming course. This latter interpretation is consistent with information given elsewhere in the paper: "All schools of sports sciences at the universities of Jordan offer mandatory, reliable, and valid swimming programs. Students enroll in one of three swimming courses consequently: the basic, intermediate, and advanced levels". (Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535, emphasis added)

**** That is, if the sample is unrepresentative of the population, there is no way to know how biased the sample might be. However, if there is a representative sample, then although there will still likely be some error (the results for the sample will not be precisely what the results across the whole population would be) it is possible to calculate the likely size of this error (e.g., say ±3%) which will be smaller when a higher proportion of the population are sampled.

***** It is possible some text that was intended to be at this point has gone missing during production – as, oddly, the following sentence is

facilisi, veritus invidunt ei mea (Times New Roman, 10)
Bayyat et al., 2021: 4535

which seems to be an accidental retention of text from the journal's paper template.

Talking about 'Women Health'

Keith S. Taber

Strangely the invitation supposedly from William Stella, Conference Manager of the 'Webinar- Women Health' seems to have been sent to me by a Sara Jones of unitedresearchforum.org. Sara, or perhaps William (or perhaps Stella if the name 'William Stella' is to be read in the same way as 'Taber Keith S' as I was addressed?) would apprently be honoured if I would give a Keynote talk – about Women['s] health presumably?

Respected Taber Keith S, Greetings Hope you're staying safe and healthy during this pandemic. We would like to cordially invite you to partake as a Keynote Speaker for the upcoming "Webinar- Women Health". It is an online conference scheduled for 16-17th of September 2021. The webinar is a leading forum for Doctors, Physicians, Women Health Researchers, Public Health Professionals, Academicians i.e., Professors Associate Professors, Assistant Professors, novice researchers, and budding scientists. We are open for the Q & A Sessions, Panel Discussions with the Keynote Speaker/Attendees. Break out rooms with the requested attendees. For more information: … We look forward to a positive confirmation, an honor for us indeed. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you require any additional information and support from our side. Thank you Best Regards William Stella | Conference Manager

I cannot immediately see what I would have to offer, but perhaps Sara / William / Stella has spotted some connection I have missed. Otherwise, it seems that the state of the academic conference industry has got to such a low point that anyone prepared to offer a keynote on any topic is considered good enough to put in front of (I assume) paying customers?

The scientific committee

The webinar has a scientific committee, also refered to as the organising committee who – one would assume – are at least consulted on possible keynote speakers (otherwise what is the point of such a committee?) and each member seems to be a genuine academic or professional who clearly has expertise relevant to the weninar topic. Academics allowing their names to be published as members of such a committee give prestige to the event (whilst adding an entry to their own c.v./résumé) but this is only meaningful if they are actively involved in organising the meeting. Well, I await enlightenment:

Invitation to be a Keynote Speaker: Webinar- Women Health

Dear Conference Manager William Stella (and Sara Jones) Thank you and your organising committee (Prof. Filiz Namdar Pekiner, Dr Tatiana Zavarykina, Dr Jeffrey V Leyton, Catharine Janssen, Dr Daniela Capdepon and Prof. Sophia Karagiannis) for the kind invitation to be a Keynote Speaker at 'Webinar- Women Health'. I am currently very busy with a range of projects and so have to decline most such invitations, but I do recognise that this is a very important topic where I should seek to contribute if I can genuinely be of use. You kindly invite me contact you for any additional information, and so I hope you do not mind if I ask which aspect of my research and scholarship you were hoping I might present on. I am sure that you and your impressive international scientific committee deliberate carefully before honouring colleagues with such prestigious invitations, but it is not immediately obvious to me which strand of my work would be most relevant to the intended audience of this particular webinar. If you are able to tell me which of my project(s) or publication(s) you had in mind as a basis for the Keynote when you issued the invitation, then I would be happy to give serious consideration to whether I could prepare a Keynote talk for the Webinar along those lines. You can find details of my work at: https://www.educ.cam.ac.uk/people/staff/taber/ https://science-education-research.com/projects/ https://science-education-research.com/publications/ I am looking forward to learning more about how my work might contribute to this webinar on a very serious and important topic. Yours sincerely Keith

Read about conferences and poor academic practice

Read about the weak basis of invitations to contribute to academic enterprises

Scientific errors in the English National Curriculum

Keith S. Taber

I am writing this open letter to the Institute of Physics and the Royal Society of Chemistry to request that as Learned Societies with some influence with government (perhaps limited, but certainly vastly more than an academic) the Societies might ask the Department for Education to correct two basic errors of science in the National Curriculum for England which is set out as the basis for teaching school age learerns and for developing public examinations specifications and papers.

The two errors relate to (a) the misuse of scientific terminology (the word substance) and (b) a failure of logic (in a reference to conservation of energy). As you will no doubt be aware, the original published version of this iteration of the programmes of study for science in the English National Curriculum included some basic errors (incorrect physics formulae) that received wide publicity and which were quickly amended. Despite some other issues also getting early attention, these other problems have never been addressed. One more complex issue that I strongly feel deserves addressing, but which would would require considerable redrafting, is the confused and incoherent treatment of the nature of chemical reactions across the secondary phase (Key Stages 3 and 4). I have raised these issues at various times, and have published a scholarly analysis of these problems .Whilst I obviously did not expect an article in an academic journal to directly impact policy, I thought this could be a 'springboard' to then approach government. I have contacted the relevant ministers (the Rt Hon Gavin Williamson CBE MP, Secretary of State for Education and the Rt Hon Nick Gibb MP, Minister of State for School Standards), and in response to instructions to refer this issue to the Department for Education website, I did so. My comments have been noted, but I was informed

"there are no current plans to review the curriculum".

Whilst I accept that any detailed re-working of the curriculum is not imminent, I do think the Department could still instigate minor corrections to errors which are published on the government's website, and then consequently repeated by the examination authorities, the examination boards and even individual school websites. Correcting these (surely, embarrassing) errors would require very little effort. The first error I refer to is the incorrect use of the term 'substance'. In science, the term substance has a fairly specific meaning. Although, as with many science concepts, there may be some discussion over precise definitions and demarcations, there is general agreement at the level at which the term would be used in introductory science at school level. In the primary stages of the English National Curriculum for Science we read that Y5 learners should be

"taught to…explain that some changes result in the formation of new materials [sic], and that this kind of change is not usually reversible, including changes associated with burning and the action of acid on bicarbonate of soda".

A better term here would be 'substances', not 'materials' (although this is more a mater of the wording being imprecise than incorrect). However in relation to Y4 learners there is a reference to

"exploring the effect of temperature on substances [sic] such as chocolate, butter, cream"

none of which are substances as the word is used in science.This is a misuse of the term 'substance'. So whereas in secondary school, learners are taught to distinguish the meanings of 'material' and the more specific 'substance', it seems these terms are being used interchangeably in the National Curriculum specification itself. The other issue relates to the statement (in the Key Stage 4 specification) that

"energy is conserved in chemical reactions so can therefore be neither created nor destroyed".

To my reading this suggests a blatant error of logic, which I can only assume does not reflect scientific ignorance by the person drafting the document – but more likely is a typographic error that has never been corrected. Conservation of energy is a general (universal) principle, and its more specific application to chemical reactions as one class of changes is then subsumed under that principle. I have long assumed that what had been intended (but mistyped) was either "energy is conserved in chemical reactions BECAUSE it can be neither created nor destroyed" or "energy CAN be neither created nor destroyed SO THEREFORE is conserved in chemical reactions" – that is, the logic has been completely reversed in the curriculum document. I have recently realised that there is a third possibility: that this statement is not meant as an explanation (of energy conservation in reactions under a more general principle) but as a definition, along the lines "energy is conserved in chemical reactions WHICH MEANS THAT IT CAN be neither created nor destroyed". Whatever was meant, the current wording implies a logical non sequitur, and should, surely, be corrected. I would hope you might agree that these kinds of errors should not be included in what teachers are asked to teach, students to learn, and examining boards to assess; and that when a suitable opportunity arrises you might make appropriate representations regarding the desirability of corrections being made. Your sincerely, Dr Keith S.Taber Emeritus Professor of Science Education (I have had constructive replies from both the RSC and IoP)

Guiding the work of palliative care

Keith S. Taber

I recently heard from the journal 'Archives of Palliative Care' who claim to be able to "enhance the quality" of my work. As – to the best of my knowledge – palliative care is an area of medical work seeking to make life as comfortable as possible for the terminally ill, this is not a journal I've tended to read.

From Editorial Assistant– Archives of Palliative Care Call for paper: community engaged Dear Dr. Taber Keith S I enjoyed your recent paper with the title Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios. We would like to continue working in this area under your guidance. Would you please tell me whether you have any new manuscripts available in your area of site? Thank you for your time

I have written back to see how the journal feels I can contribute…as surely Sherline would not have written to me to tell me she had read my work and feels it is relevant to her journal unless that is indeed true?

Dear Sherline Thank you for your kind message. It was so good to hear that you enjoyed our article 'Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios'. It was quite a small piece of work arising from a larger collaborative project, but I was rather proud of it. It is always rewarding to hear that someone has found time to engage with the work and has got something useful from it. I was intrigued to learn that 'Archives of Palliative Care' is interested is working in this area under my guidance, as I do not think we would likely have considered the journal an obvious outlet for our work. I am not sure we have anything else worked up for submission at this time, but perhaps if you could tell me what aspects of 'Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios' you found especially relevant, and how you feel our work can best contribute to 'Archives of Palliative Care' then I could give some serious consideration to whether we might have anything yet to be worked up which it might be suitable. Best wishes
Keith

The article Sherline enjoyed does include some comments of young people reflecting on whether they would be comfortable in entering medicine as a career (as one of a number of focal areas of scientific work discussed in the study), but that link seems a little tenuous to think our research fits in a journal on palliative care. But perhaps Sherline will get back to me and enlighten me.

Update:

Sherline has indeed got back to me: On 15/07/2021 11:39, Archives of Palliative Care wrote:

Dear Dr. Taber Keith S, Greetings!! Thank you for your immediate response towards our journal. The knowledge present in your published manuscript is so useful to future researchers . this was the reason we want to publish your manuscript in our journal. Awaiting for your response. Best Regards,

This response remains at a very general level, indeed the kind of repsonses that Sherline could have made even if she was not an honest person, and had not even read the article ('Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios') she had claimed to have enjoyed so much. So, I remain unconvinced, but await clarification of how my work is relevant.

Dear Sherline Thank you for your comments. It is obviously gratifying that you see so much of value in our work, and flattering that you want to publish a manuscript from me in your journal 'on spec' (that is, without even seeing what I might write). I imagine I could write something developing my thoughts further on this topic, but do you really feel that this would fit in your journal? (And would it not be a matter for referees to evaluate the relevance and quality of the work in peer review – or do you include invited papers?) Of course, I would like to contribute if that were viable, if I were to be persuaded that my work was relevant to your readers, but I am busy with other ongoing writing and despite your very kind evaluation of my recent work I would need some convincing that there really is a good fit with Archives of Palliative Care. Best wishes Keith

Sadly, whilst my initial response to the invitation was that this was an entirely incongruent request as anything I could write would not be relevant to the journal, as I composed this response I started to actually think about how I could devleop something building on the the publsihed work which might exlpore how young people might feel about going to work in palliative care medicine… Perhaps there would be a role for me in enticing submissions for dodgy journals?

Read about 'Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios'

Read about journals and poor academic practice

Read about more examples of illogical connections between published work and invitations from journals and conferences

COVID is like a fire because…

Keith S. Taber

Dampening down COVID? (Image by Iván Tamás from Pixabay)

Analogy in science

Analogy is a common technique used in science and science education. In scientific work analogy may be used as a thinking tool useful for generating hypotheses to explore – "what if X is like Y, then that might mean…". That is, we think we understand system Y, so, if for a moment we imagine that system X may be similar, then by analogy that would mean (for example) that A may be the cause of B, or that if we increase C then we might expect D to decrease… Suggesting analogies has been used as a way of introducing a creative activity into school science (Taber, 2016).

Read about analogies in science

Scientists also sometimes use analogies to explain their ideas and results to other scientists. However, analogies are especially useful in explaining abstract ideas to non-experts, so they are used in the public communication of science by comparing technical topics with more familiar, everyday ('lifeworld') phenomena. In the same way, teachers use analogies as one technique for 'making the unfamiliar familiar' by suggesting that the unfamiliar curriculum focus (the target concept to be taught) is in some ways just like a familiar lifeworld phenomena (the analogue or source concept).

Read about science in public discourse and the media

Read about making the unfamiliar familiar

COVID is like a fire…

So, I was interested to hear Prof. Andrew Hayward, Professor of Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Inclusion Health Research at UCL (University College London), being interviewed on the radio and suggesting that COVID was like a fire:

"Sometimes I like to think of, you know, COVID as a fire, if we are the fuel, social mixing is the oxygen that allows the fuel to burn, vaccines the water that stops the fuel from burning, and COVID cases are the sparks that spread the fire. So, we are doing well on vaccines, but there's lots of dried wood left."

There's quite a lot going on in that short statement. If Prof. Hayward had stopped at "sometimes I like to think of COVID as a fire" this would have been a simile where it is simply observed that one thing is conceived as being a bit like another.

Simile offers a comparison and leaves the listener or reader to work out the nature of the similarity (whereas metaphor, where one thing is described to be another, an example would be 'COVID is a fire', leaves the audience to even appreciate a comparison is being made). Analogy goes further, as it makes a comparison between two conceptual structures (two systems), such that by mapping across them we can understand how the structure of the unfamiliar is suggested to be like the more familiar structure.

That is, there is a mapping (see the figure below) that is based on pairings across the analogy. Here fire and COVID disease are each treated as systems with components that are structured in a parallel way:

COVID (illness): fire
people: fuel
social mixing: oxygen
vaccines: water
COVID cases: sparks

A graphic representation of Prof. Hayward's use of analogy

A lot of us are like kindling

Moreover, having set up this analogy, we are offered some additional information – we are doing well on vaccines (= there is plenty of water to stop fuel burning), but there is still a lot of dried wood. The listener has to understand that the dry wood refers to fuel, and this maps (in the analogy) onto lots of people who can still become infected.

I suspect most people (science teachers perhaps excepted) listening to this interview will not have even explicitly noticed the nature of the analogy, but rather automatically processed the comparison. They would have understood the message about COVID through the analogy, rather than having to actively analyse the analogy itself.

We can stop the sparks spreading the fire

Professor Hayward was asked about contact tracing and suggested that

"…the key thing is the human discussion with somebody who has COVID to identify who their contacts are and to ask them to isolate as well, and that really stops those sparks getting into the population and really helps to dampen down the fire."

That is, that potential COVID cases (that are like sparks in the fire system) can be prevented from mixing with the wider population (who are like fuel in the fire system) and this will dampen down the fire (the illness in the COVID system). {Note 'dampen down' seems to be a metaphor here rather than a true part of the analogy (in which it is the vaccines that have the effect of 'literally' {analogously} dampening down the fire). Stopping sparks mixing with fuel will limit new areas of combustion starting rather than dampening down the existing fire.}

An argument about contact tracing made using the analogy

Again, most people listening to this would likely have taken on board the intended meaning quite automatically, without having to deliberately analyse this answer – even though the response shifts between the target topics (the COVID disease system) and the analogue (the fire system) – so the sparks (fire system – equivalent to infectious cases) are stopped from getting into the population (COVID system – equivalent to the fuel supply).

This is reminiscent of chemistry teaching which slips back and forth between macroscopic and molecular levels of description – and so where references to, for example, hydrogen could mean the substance or the molecule – and the same word may have a different referent at different points in the same utterance (Taber, 2013). Whether this is problematic depends upon the past experiences of the listener – someone with extensive experience of a domain (probably most of the audience of a serious news magazine programme understand enough about combustion and infection to not have to deliberate on the analogy discussed here) can usually make these shifts automatically without getting confused.

Fire requires…AND…AND…

An analogy can only be effective when the analogue is indeed more familiar to the audience (you cannot make the unfamiliar familiar by comparing an unfamiliar target with an analogue that is also unfamiliar) so the use of the analogy by Professor Hayward assumed some basic knowledge about fire. Indeed it seemed to assume knowledge of the so-called 'fire triangle'.

Three factors are need to initiate/maintain combustion: fire may be stopped by removing one or more of these.

This is the idea that for a fire to commence or continue there need to be three things: something combustible to act as fuel; AND oxygen (or another suitable substance – as when iron filings burn in chlorine – but in usual circumstances it will be oxygen); AND a source of energy sufficient to initiate reaction (as burning is exothermic, once a fire is underway it may generate enough heat to maintain combustion – and sparks may spread the fire to nearby combustible material). To extinguish a fire, one needs to remove at least one of these factors – water can act as a heat sink to decrease the temperature, and may also reduce the contact between the fuel and oxygen. Preventing sparks from transferring hot material that can initiate further sites of combustion (providing energy to more fuel) can also be important.

Unobtrusive pedagogy

The quotes here were part of a short interview with a broadcast journalist and intended for a general public audience. Prof. Hayward introduced and developed his analogy as just sharing a way of thinking, and indeed analogy is such a common device in conversation that it was not obviously marked as a pedagogic technique. However, when we think about how such a device works, and what is expected of the audience to make sense of it, I think it is quite impressive how we can often 'decode' and understand such comparisons without any conscious effort. Providing, of course, that the analogue is indeed familiar, and the mapping across the two conceptual structures can be seen to fit.

Works cited:

Taber, K. S. (2013). Revisiting the chemistry triplet: drawing upon the nature of chemical knowledge and the psychology of learning to inform chemistry education. Chemistry Education Research and Practice, 14(2), 156-168. doi:10.1039/C3RP00012E

Taber, K. S. (2016). 'Chemical reactions are like hell because…': Asking gifted science learners to be creative in a curriculum context that encourages convergent thinking. In M. K. Demetrikopoulos & J. L. Pecore (Eds.), Interplay of Creativity and Giftedness in Science (pp. 321-349). Rotterdam: Sense. (Download the author's manuscript version of this chapter.)

Those flipping, confounding variables!

Keith S. Taber

Alternative interpretations and a study on flipped learning

Image by Please Don't sell My Artwork AS IS from Pixabay

Flipping learning

I was reading about a study of 'flipped learning'. Put very simply, the assumption behind flipped learning is that usually teaching follows a pattern of (a) class time spent with the teacher lecturing, followed by (b) students working through examples largely in their own time. This is a pattern that was (and perhaps still is) often found in Universities in subjects that largely teach though lecture courses.

The flipped learning approach switches the use the class time to 'active' learning activities, such as working through exercises, by having students undertake some study before class. That is, students learn about what would have been presented in the lecture by reading texts, watching videos, interacting with on-line learning resources, and so forth, BEFORE coming to class. The logic is that the teacher's input is more useful when students are being challenged to apply the new ideas than as a means of presenting information.

That is clearly a quick gloss, and clearly much more could be said about the rationale, the assumptions behind the approach,and its implementation.

(Read more about flipped learning)

However, in simple terms, the mode of instruction for two stages of the learning process

being informed of scientific ideas (through a lecture)
applying those ideas (in unsupported private study)

are 'flipped' to

being informed of scientific ideas (through accessing learning resources)
applying those ideas (in a context where help and feedback is provided)

Testing pedagogy

So much for the intention, but does it work? That is where research comes in. If we want to test a hypothesis, such as 'students will learn more if learning is flipped' (or 'students will enjoy their studies more if learning is flipped', or 'more students will opt to study the subject further if learning is flipped', or whatever) then it would seem an experiment is called for.

In principle, experiments allow us to see if changing some factor (say, the sequence of activities in a course module) will change some variable (say, student scores on a test). The experiment is often the go-to methodology in natural sciences: modify one variable, and measure any change in another hypothesised to be affected by it, whilst keeping everything else that could conceivably have an influence constant. Even in science, however, it is seldom that simple, and experiments can never actually 'prove' our hypothesis is correct (or false).

(Read more about the scientific method)

In education, running experiments is even more challenging (Taber, 2019). Learners, classes, teachers, courses, schools, universities are not 'natural kinds'. That is, the kind of comparability you can expect between two copper sulphate crystals of a given mass, or two specimens of copper wire of given dimensions, does not apply: it can matter a lot whether you are testing this student or that student, or if the class is taught one teacher or another.

People respond to conditions different to inanimate objects – if testing the the conductivity of a sample of a salt solution of a given concentration it should not matter if it is Monday morning of Thursday afternoon, or whether it is windy outside, or which team lost last's night's match, or even whether the researcher is respectful or rude to the sample. Clearly when testing the motivation or learning of students, such things could influence measurements. Moreover, a sample of gas neither knows or cares what you are expecting to happen when you compress it, but people can be influenced by the expectations of researchers (so called expectancy effect – also known as the Pygmalion effect).

(Read about experimental research into teaching innovations)

Flipping the fundamentals of analytic chemistry

In the study, by Ponikwer and Patel, researchers flipped part of a module on the fundamentals of analytical chemistry, which was part of a BSc honours degree in biomedical science. The module was divided into three parts:

absorbance and emission spectrosocopy
chromatography and electrophoresis
mass spectroscopy and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy

Students were taught the first topics by the usual lectures, then the topics of chromatography and electrophoresis were taught 'flipped', before the final topics were taught through the usual lectures. This pattern was repeated over three successive years.

[Figure 1 in the paper offers a useful graphical representation of the study design. If I had been prepared to pay SpringerNature a fee, I would have been allowed to reproduce it here.*]

The authors of the study considered the innovation a success

This study suggests that flipped learning can be an effective model for teaching analytical chemistry in single topics and potentially entire modules. This approach provides the means for students to take active responsibility in their learning, which they can do at their own pace, and to conduct problem-solving activities within the classroom environment, which underpins the discipline of analytical chemistry. (Ponikwer & Patel, 2018: p.2268)

Confounding variables

Confounding variables are other factors which might vary between conditions and have an effect.

Read about confounding variables

Ponikwer and Patel were aware that one needs to be careful in interpreting the data collected in such a study. For example, it is not especially helpful to consider how well students did on the examination questions at the end of term to see if students did as well, or better, on the flipped topics that the other topics taught. Clearly students might find some topics, or indeed some questions, more difficult than others regardless of how they studied. Ponikwer and Patel reported that on average students did significantly better on questions from the flipped elements, but included important caveats

"This improved performance could be due to the flipped learning approach enhancing student learning, but may also be due to other factors, such as students finding the topic of chromatography more interesting or easier than spectroscopy, or that the format of flipped learning made students feel more positive about the subject area compared with those subject areas that were delivered traditionally." (Ponikwer & Patel, 2018: p.2267)

Whilst acknowledging such alternative explanations for their findings might seem to undermine their results it is good science to be explicit about such caveats. Looking for (and reporting) alternative explanations is a key part of the scientific attitude.

This good scientific practice is also clear where the authors discuss how attendance patterns varied over the course. The authors report that the attendance at the start of the flipped segment was similar to what had come before, but then attendance increased slightly during the flipped learning section of the course. They point out this shift was "not significant", that is statistics suggested it could not be ruled out to be a chance effect.

However Ponikwer and Patel do report a statistically "significant reduction in the attendance at the non-flipped lectures delivered after the flipped sessions" (p.2265) – that is, once students had experienced the flipped learning, on average they tended to attend normal lectures less later in their course. The authors suggest this could be a positive reaction to how they experienced the flipped learning, but again they point out that there were confounding variables, and other interpretations could not ruled out:

"This change in attendance may be due to increased engagement in the flipped learning module; however, it could also reflect a perception that a more exciting approach of lecturing or content is to be delivered. The enhanced level of engagement may also be because students could feel left behind in the problem-solving workshop sessions. The reduction in attendance after the flipped lecture may be due to students deciding to focus on assessments, feeling that they may have met the threshold attendance requirement" (Ponikwer & Patel, 2018: p.2265).

So, with these students, taking this particular course, in this particular university, having this sequence of topics based on some traditional and some flipped learning, there is some evidence of flipped learning better engaging students and leading to improved learning – but subject to a wide range of caveats which allow various alternative explanations of the findings.

(Read about caveats to research conclusions)

Pointless experiments?

Given the difficulties of interpreting experiments in education, one may wonder if there is any point in experiments in teaching and learning. On the other hand, for the lecturing staff on the course, it would seem strange to get these results, and dismiss them (it has not been proved that flipped learning has positive effects, but the results are at least suggestive and we can only base our action on the available evidence).

Moreover, Ponikwer and Patel collected other data, such as students' perceptions of the advantages and challenges of the flipped learning approach – data that can complement their statistical tests, and also inform potential modifications of the implementation of flipped learning for future iterations of the course.

(Read about the use of multiple research techniques in studies)

Is generalisation possible?

What does this tell us about the use of flipped learning elsewhere? Studies taking place in a single unique teaching and learning context do not automatically tell us what would have been the case elsewhere – with different lecturing staff, different demographic of students, when learning about marine ecology or general relativity. Such studies are best seen as context-directed, as being most relevant to here they are carried out.

However, again, even if research cannot be formally generalised, that does not mean that it cannot be informative to those working elsewhere who may apply a form of 'reader generalisation' to decide either:

a) that teaching and learning context seems very similar to ours: it might be worth trying that here;

b) that is a very different teaching and learning context to ours: it may not be worth the effort and disruption to try that out here based on the findings in such a different context.

(Read about generalisation)

This requires studies to give details of the teaching and learning context where they were carried out (so called 'thick description'). Clearly the more similar a study context is to one's own teaching context, and the wider the range of teaching and learning contexts where a particular pedagogy or teaching approach has been shown to have positive outcomes, the more reason there is to feel it is with trying something out in own's own classroom.

I have argued that:

"What are [common in the educational research literature] are individual small-scale experiments that cannot be considered to offer highly generalisable results. Despite this, where these individual studies are seen as being akin to case studies (and reported in sufficient detail) they can collectively build up a useful account of the range of application of tested innovations. That is, some inherent limitations of small-scale experimental studies can be mitigated across series of studies, but this is most effective when individual studies offer thick description of teaching contexts and when contexts for 'replication' studies are selected to best complement previous studies." (Taber, 2019: 106)

In that regard, studies like that of Ponikwer and Patel can be considered not as 'proof' of the effectiveness of flipped learning, but as part of a cumulative evidence base for the value of trying out the approach in various teaching situations.

Why I have not included the orignal figure showing the study design

* I had hoped to include in this post a copy of the figure in the paper showing the study design. The paper is not published open access and so the copyright in the 'design' (that, is the design of the figure **, not the study!) means that it cannot be legally reprodiced without permission. I sought permission to reproduce the figure here through (SpringerNature) the publisher's on line permissions request system, explaining this was to be used in an acdemics scholar's personal blog.

Springer granted permission for reuse, but subject to a fee of £53.83.

As copyright holder/managers they are perfectly entitled to do that. However, I had assumed that they would offer free use for a non-commercial purpose that offers free publicity to their publication. I have other uses for my pension, so I refer readers interested in seeing the figure to the original paper.

** Under the conventions associated with copyright law the reproduction of short extracts of an academic paper for the purposes of criticism and review is normally considered 'fair use' and exempt from copyright restrictions. However, any figure (or table) is treated as a discrete artistic design and cannot be copied from a work in copyright without permission.

(Read about copyright and scholarly works)

Work cited:

Ponikwer, F., & Patel, B. A. (2018). Implementation and evaluation of flipped learning for delivery of analytical chemistry topics. Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, 410(9), 2263-2269. doi:10.1007/s00216-018-0892-2
Taber, K. S. (2019). Experimental research into teaching innovations: responding to methodological and ethical challenges. Studies in Science Education, 55(1), 69-119. doi:10.1080/03057267.2019.1658058

The Arts in Our Hearts and the Creativity in our Science

Keith S. Taber

A(nother) point of view?

Bernardine Evaristo argues for a broad curriculum

On Sunday morning I heard Bernardine Evaristo reading her essay 'The Arts in Our Hearts' in BBC Radio 4's weekly 'A Point of View' slot. It was a heartfelt and compelling argument for the importance of investing in the arts in education (and well worth a listen).

Demoting creativity?

Evaristo complained about the lack of support for the arts in the current curriculum context.

"We have an educational provision that demotes and demeans creativity in the hierarchy of subjects"

Since the introduction of the Natural Curriculum in England, science, mathematics and English have had a specials status, and in recent years the arts have been squeezed – often treated as luxuries and foci for extra-curricular provision. Among the points Evaristo made were that it was inappropriate to pressure all children towards STEM (i.e., science, technology, engineering and mathematics) subjects "because [it is suggested] that's where the future lies", as education is not just about preparing for work, and (even if it were) degrees in the arts and humanities can perfectly well lead to good careers; and also arts education supports the development of creativity – "the very creativity that might one day lead them to a career in science or engineering".

I found much to agree with here.

A (personal) science bias

I was fascinated with science as a child. When I entered secondary school I was asked what I wanted to do when I left. I said I wanted to go to University to do science. (All my subsequent careers input took the form of the single annual leading question: "Do you still want to go to University to study science?") I did a chemistry degree. I trained to teach chemistry and physics. I became a science teacher, then a science lecturer, and then a science education lecturer. I was never any good at art, failed to learn to play an instrument well, cannot dance (even my swimming is a potential danger to others, and – when I am in the lane closest to the pool wall- to my own fingers)…there was no way I was going to become an artist. So, I might be considered to have a science bias.

Why educate?

But I totally agree with the gist of what Evaristo argued. Education is not about preparing people for jobs, and it should not be primarily about helping them acquire skills for the jobs market. That cannot be totally ignored, but that sounds more like training than education. Education has multiple purposes and these need to be reflected in curriculum (Taber, 2019). Certainly we want education to allow young people to have the chance to progress to achieve their goals – which may be to become a heart surgeon, a cosmologist, or a marine biologist. Or, it may be to be a journalist, novelist, choreographer, songwriter, historian, film critic…

But education is about developing the whole person, and that will not happen when the curriculum is too narrow. Education is also about inducting learners into the culture of their society (and increasingly the 'global village' moves towards being one suprasociety). Children should be supported in engaging with a wide range of different areas, even if they decide they do not wish to later follow-up some or most of these.

And this does not just mean following-up for for employment: a person who becomes a sculptor should have their life outside the studio enhanced due to what they experienced in school science, just as someone who becomes a pharmacist should have their life outside the dispensary enhanced due to what they experienced in arts classes; and someone who becomes an office cleaner or who works in a customer service call centre has the right to have their life enhanced by the range of school experiences across the curriculum.

Culture and civil-isation

I value having gone to the theatre from school, and on a trip to hear a symphony orchestra. I never went to ballet or opera, but I would want all children to be offered these experiences. Children should not leave school without some art history – not highly theoretical, but having had a chance to become familiar with different styles of painting. And so with other areas of our common inheritance – and not limited to what might be called 'high culture'. (Consider the popularity on mainstream television channels of programmes about ballroom dancing, cooking, gardening, antiques collecting, landscape and portrait painting, interior design/decoration, making/renovating/recycling, and so forth.)

This is what it means to be civilised.

Without experiencing different aspects of culture, at least having a taster of what is out there, children are not being fully inducted into that culture. Where schools do not offer this, we have a two-tier society – where some children are able to access the breadth of culture because of home background, and others (perhaps partly because socio-economic conditions do not allow, but perhaps partly simply because the parents were themselves never offered glimpses of these options in their own education) miss out. Bernstein's notion of 'restricted code' can be understood in a wider sense than just access to forms of language.

It is not acceptable that a broad education offering access to informed choices about later engagement in the wider culture is offered to those who can afford private education or extra-curricular enrichment activities, but the rest have to settle for, hopefully, being employable.

'To live without my music, would be (near) impossible to do…'

I was never going to be an artist, but works of art have given me much pleasure. Arguably music has been as important to me as science – the constant companion since my adolescence (I feel a John Miles lyric seeking to make itself felt here). I cannot sing well, play an instrument, or even whistle in tune. I cannot tell the key a piece is in. I have somewhat eclectic tastes, and indeed some might indeed suggest little taste at all – but 'I know what I like (in your wardrobe)' and what has uplifted me, puzzled me, excited me, consoled me, calmed me, comforted me – what music can do to transcend the moment and shift the mood – surely that's what really matters?

So I'm there 100% – an education that prioritises the sciences over the humanities, and, even more so, over the arts, is as distorted as the curriculum of the original grammar schools which would not have known what to with with natural philosophy (proto-science), and found the idea of adding Greek to the curriculum something of a progressive innovation. Of course, that is an ahistorical judgement (ignoring the context at the time), whereas today there is no excuse for this kind of short-sightedness.

But I do have just a couple of reservations about Evaristo's essay, or more to the point, what could be taken away from it.

We need to encourage all young people to see STEM options as open, and welcoming, to them

My first slight reservation is that although I agree that we should not pressure all children towards science and other STEM areas, we should bear in mind that some groups have historically been underrepresented in science subjects, and some children may have been given the impression that science is not for the likes of them. We need to do all we can to make science inclusive – science (as with art) is a core part of all our culture, and a universal human activity. We should not push everyone into science, but we need to make it clear that no one is excluded because of gender or ethnicity or religious faith or other kinds of (claimed or perceived) group identity. So, science teachers should encourage everyone to believe that science could be for them, but working on a level playing field with other teachers promoting their own areas.

Science IS creative

My second, slight, query is the identification of creativity with arts education. That is not to say that arts education does not offer opportunities for creativity – of course it does – but rather the potential inference that science education can not.

Evaristo recognises that creativity is important to the professional in STEM fields, so surely science education needs to develop this. Science has a rightly deserved reputation for logic, reasoning, and rational thought – but this can only work on the creative ideas that scientists develop: without the imaginative invention of novel ideas to test, there would be no experiments or data to do any logical analysis with ( Taber, 2011).

So when Bernardine Evaristo refers to "play, a.k.a the arts" she neglects the role of play in science. When this play takes place in the lab', it needs to be play subject to a careful risk assessment, certainly, but it is still a form of play. A period of familiarisation with a phenomenon is often essential background for developing an investigative strategy.

Creativity is part of an authentic science education

That is not to say I am claiming that this creativity is always obvious in science education. Over-packed curriculum specifications that make science courses seem like an endless barrage of unconnected topics, and mark schemes designed as if for automatons examining work produced by automatons having been instructed by automatons, seem designed to squeeze out any opportunities for teaching and learning that can offer an authentic feel for what science is actually like. All work, no play, makes Jacqueline a dull scientist, and so unlikely to discover anything substantially new. So yes, perhaps "We have an educational provision that demotes and demeans creativity in the hierarchy of subjects" through, first, locating STEM subjects at the pinnacle, but, then, also by misrepresenting them as not being creative.

Of course, there are enrichment activities that allow learners to be creative in science activities, and to engage with projects or topics over extended periods of time – and so give more of an authentic feel for scientific enquiry. The CREST awards scheme from 'the British Ass' (The British Science Association) is just one example (Taber & Cole, 2010). But then, like extra-curricular arts, this is not available in all schools, and, moreover, students should not need to go outside the curriculum to get authentic and creative science education.

Curriculum breadth is not a luxury

So, yes, I totally agree that:

"it's vital for the country's future that we reject, once and for all, the notion that the arts are a luxury"

But I would also argue that it is vital for humanity's future that we reject, once and for all, the notion that science is only about logic, and that only the arts offer creativity.

Everyone should be introduced in their schooling to all the key aspects of our culture. And just as art education has to involve creating, not only being taught art history or appreciation, science education has to offer a feel for science as a practice, not just a never-ending parade of theories, models, laws, and so forth, previously created by someone else (and most often a dead, 'white', male someone). Creativity in science is clearly different in its expression to creativity in the arts – and so both should be experienced in everyone's schooling.

Work cited:

Taber, K. S. (2011). The natures of scientific thinking: creativity as the handmaiden to logic in the development of public and personal knowledge. In M. S. Khine (Ed.), Advances in the Nature of Science Research – Concepts and Methodologies (pp. 51-74). Dordrecht: Springer.
Taber, K. S. (2019) MasterClass in Science Education: Transforming teaching and learning. London, Bloomsbury.
Taber, K. S., & Cole, J. (2010). The CREST awards scheme: Challenging gifted and talented students through creative STEM project work. School Science Review, 92(339), 117-126.

Catalysis as an analogy for scaffolding

Keith S. Taber

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

A key part of teaching or communicating science, is about 'making the unfamiliar familiar'.

(Read about 'Making the unfamiliar familiar')

Analogies can be used as pedagogic devices to make the unfamiliar familiar' – that is by suggesting that something (the unfamiliar thing being explained) is somehow like something else (that is already familiar), the unfamiliar can start to become familiar. The analogy functions like a bridge between the known and the unknown. (Note: the idea of a bridge is being used as simile there – another device that can be used to help make the unfamiliar familiar.)

(Read about 'analogies in science')

(Read about 'similes in science')

For an analogy (or simile) to work, the person being taught or communicated with has to already be familiar with the 'source' that act as an analogue for the 'target' being communicated. (If someone did not know what a bridge was, what it is used for, then it would be no help to them to be told that an analogy can function like one! Indeed it would probably just confuse matters.)

An analogy is based on some mapping of structure between two different systems. For example, at one time a common teaching analogy was that the atom was like a tiny solar system. For that to be useful to a learner, they would need to be more familiar with the solar system than the atom. To be used as an effective teaching analogy, the learner would have to understand the relevant parts of the conceptual structure of the solar system idea that were being mapped across to the atom (perhaps a relatively large central mass, the idea of a number of less massive bodies orbiting in some way, a force between the central and peripheral bodies responsible for the centripetal acceleration of the orbiting bodies…).

A person might easily map across irrelevant aspects of the source to the target, perhaps as all the planets are different then all electrons must be different! This might explain why some students assume the force holding the atom together is gravitational!

(Read about 'Understanding Analogous Atomic and Solar Systems')

In teaching science, it is common to use everyday sources as analogues for scientific ideas. But, of course, it is also possible to use scientific ideas as the source to try to explain other target ideas.

Below I reproduce an extract from a recent publication (Taber & Li, 2001). I developed an analogy between enzymatic catalysis (a scientific concept) and scaffolding of learning (an educational or psychological concept), to use is a chapter I co-wrote with Xinyue Li .

(Read about 'Scaffolding learning')

The mapping I had in mind was something like this:

Aspect	Source (Enzymatic catalysis)	Target (Scaffolding)
Process	Chemical reaction	Development of new knowledge/skills
Impediment	Large activation energy – barrier far greater than energy available to reactant species	Large learning demand – gap between current capability and mastery of new knowledge/skill exceeds manageable 'learning quantum'
Intervention	Addition of enzyme	Mediation by 'teacher'
Mechanism	Provides alternative reaction pathway with small energy barriers	Structures learning by modelling activity, and leads learner through small manageable steps
Matching	The enzyme 'fits' the reactant molecule and readily binds	A good scaffold matches the learners' current capacity to progress in learning (in the so-called 'ZPD')
Degrees of freedom	The binding of the enzyme to a substrate 'guides' the subsequent molecular reconfiguration	The scaffolding guides the steps in the learning process taken by the learner

Mapping between two analogous conceptual structures

Scaffolding Learning as Akin to Enzymatic Catalysis

"Metaphors and analogies should always be considered critically, as the aspects that do not map onto the target they are being used to illustrate can often be as salient and as relevant as the aspects that map positively. Given that, and in the spirit of offering a way to imagine scaffolding (rather than an objective description) we suggest it may be useful to think of scaffolding learning as like the enzymatic catalysis of a chemical process in the body (see Figure 3).

Figure 3. Scaffolding learning can be seen as analogous to enzymatic catalysis (b) which facilitates a reaction with a substantive energy barrier (a).

Some chemical reactions are energetically viable (in chemical terms, exothermic) and so in thermodynamic terms, occur spontaneously. However, sometimes even theoretically viable (so spontaneous) reactions occur at such a slow rate that for all practical purposes there is no reaction. For example, imagine a wooden dining table in a room at 293 K (20˚C) with an atmosphere containing about 21% oxygen – a situation found in many people's homes. The combustion of the table is a viable chemical process ^[1] and indeed the wood will (theoretically) spontaneously burn in the air. Yet, of course, that does not actually happen. Despite being a thermodynamically viable process, the rate is so slow that an observer would die of old age long before seeing the table burst into flames, unless some external agent actively initiated the process. If parents returned home from an evening out to be told by their teenage children that the smouldering dining table caught alight spontaneously, the parents would be advised to suspect that actually this was not strictly true. Although the process would be energetically favourable, there is a large energy barrier to its initiation (cf. Figure 3, top image). Should sufficient energy be provided to ignite the table, then it is likely to continue to burn vigorously, but without such 'initiation energy' it would be inert.

The process of catalysis allows reactions which are energetically favourable, but which would normally occur at a slow or even negligible (and in the case of our wooden table, effectively zero) rate to occur much more quickly – by offering a new reaction pathway that has a much lower energy barrier (such that this is more readily breached by the normal distribution of particles at the ambient temperature).

In living organisms, a class of catalysts known as enzymes, catalyse reactions. Enzymes tend to be specific to particular reactions and very effective catalysts, so reactions akin to the burning of organic materials (as found in our wooden table) can occur as part of metabolism at body temperature. The second image in Figure 3 represents the same chemical reaction as in the top image (note the same start and finish points) reflecting how an enzyme changes the reaction pathway, but not the overall reaction. Two particular features of this graphical metaphor are that the overall process is broken down into a number of discrete steps, and the 'initiation energy' needed to get the process underway is very much smaller.

This is similar to the mediation of learning trough scaffolding, where a task that is currently beyond the capacity of the learner is broken down into a sequence of smaller steps, more manageable 'learning quanta', and the learner is guided along a learning pathway. The parallels go beyond this. Part of the way that an enzyme functions is that the enzyme molecule's shape is extremely well matched to bind to a target reactant molecule (something reflected in the teaching analogy of the 'lock and key' mechanism of enzymatic action: the enzyme and substrate molecules are said to fit together like a lock and key). This is analogous to how effective scaffolding requires a teacher to design a scaffold that fits the learner's current level of development: that is, her current thinking and skills. Once the substrate molecule is bound to the enzyme molecule, this then triggers a specific reconfiguration: just as a good scaffolding tool suggests to the learner a particular perspective on the subject matter.

Moreover, whereas a free substrate molecule could potentially follow a good many different pathways, once it is bound to the enzyme molecule its 'degrees of freedom' are reduced, so there are then significant constraints on which potential changes are still viable. Most organic chemistry carried out in vitro (in laboratory glassware) is inefficient as there are often many 'side reactions' that lead to unintended products, just as students may readily take away very different interpretations from the same teaching, so the yield of desired product can be low. However in vivo reactions (in living cells), being enzyme-catalysed, tend to give high yields.

The process of enzymatic catalysis therefore makes the preferred pathway much 'easier', offers a guide along the intended route, and channels change to rule out alternative pathways. Digital tools that support teaching to meet curricular aims, such as apps intended to be used by learners to support study, therefore need to offer similar affordances (structuring student learning) and constraints (reducing the degrees of freedom to go 'off track'). Clearly this will rely on design features built into the tool. Here we very briefly discuss two examples."

^[1] We avoid the term 'reaction' here, as strictly a chemical reaction occurs between specific substances. Wood is a material composed of a wide range of different compounds, and so the combustion of wood is a process encompassing a medley of concurrent reactions.
(Taber & Li, 2001, pp.55-58)

Work cited:

Taber, K. S., & Li, X. (2021). The vicarious and the virtual: A Vygotskian perspective on digital learning resources as tools for scaffolding conceptual development. In A. M. Columbus (Ed.), Advances in Psychology Research (Vol. 143, pp. 1-72). New York: Nova. (Download the chapter by clicking this link.)

Opposites avoid attracting

Do species become more different from one another to avoid breeding?

Keith S. Taber

They say "opposites attract". True perhaps for magnetic poles and electrical charges, but the aphorism is usually applied to romantic couples. It seems like one of those sayings that survives due to the 'confirmation bias' in human cognition. That is, as long as from time to time seemingly unlikely couplings occur, the explanation that 'opposites attract' seems to have some merit, even in it only applies to a minority of cases.

Trying to avoid a fight

What got me thinking about this was an interview (on BBC's Inside Science radio programme/podcast) with Dr Jacob Dunn, Associate Professor in Evolutionary Biology at Anglia Ruskin University, who studies primate vocal communication. He was discussing his research into the calls of tamarin monkeys in the Amazon rainforest, and in particular the calls of two different species where their ranges overlap.

Apparently, in the area of overlap the red-handed tamarins seemed to have adapted one of their calls so it sounds very similar to that of the pied tamarins. (N.b. The images above represent two contrasting species, just as an illustration.) The suggested explanation was that this modification made it more likely that the monkeys of different types would recognise each other's calls – in particular that "…they are trying to be understood, so they don't end up in a fight…".

Anthropomorphism?

I wondered if these monkeys were really "trying" to achieve this, or whether this might be an anthropomorphism. That is, were the red-handed tamarins deliberately changing their call in this way in order to ensure they could be understood – or was this actually natural selection in operation – where, because there was an advantage to cross-species communication (and there will be a spread of call characteristics in any population), over time calls that could be understood by monkeys of both species would be selected for in a shared niche.

Then again, primates are fairly intelligent creatures, so perhaps Dr Dunn (who, unlike me is an evolutionary biologist) means this literally, and this is something deliberate. Certainly, if the individual monkeys are shifting their calls over time in response to environmental cues, rather than the shift just occurring across generations, then that would seem to suggest this is learning rather than evolution. (Of course, it could be implicit learning based on feedback from the responses to their behavior, and still may not be the monkeys consciously adopting a strategy to be better understood.)

Becoming more distinct

Dr Dunn's explanation of the wider issue of how similar animals will compete for scarce resources intrigued me:

"When you have species that are closely related to one another and live in sort of overlapping areas there's quite a lot of pressure because they're likely to be competing for key resources. So, sometimes we see that these species actually diverge in their traits, they become more different from one another. Examples of that are sort of coloration and the way that animals look. Quite often they become more distinct than you would expect them to, to avoid breeding [sic] with one another."

My initial reaction to this was to wonder why the two species of monkeys needed to avoid breeding with each other. 'Breeding' normally refers to producing offspring, reproduction, but usually breeding is not possible across species (except sometimes to produce infertile hybrids).

Presumably, all tamarins descended from a common ancestor species. Speciation may have occurred when different populations become physically separated and so were no longer able to inter-breed (although still initially sexually compatible) simply because members of the two groups never encountered each other. Over time (i.e., many generations) the two populations might then diverge in various traits because of different selection pressures in the two different locations, or simply by chance effects* which would lead to the two gene pools drifting in different ways.

(* Read about 'Intergenerational couplings in the family: A thought experiment about ancestry')

Two groups that had formed separate species such that members of the two different species are no longer able to mate to produce fertile offspring, might subsequently come to encounter each other again (e.g., members of one species migrating into to the territory of the other) but inter-breeding would no longer be possible. A further mechanism to avoid breeding (by further "diverge[nce] in their traits") would not seem to make any difference.

If they actually cannot breed, there is no need to avoid breeding.

A breeding euphemism?

However, perhaps 'breeding' was being used by Dr Dunn as a euphemism (this was after all a family-friendly radio programme broadcast in the afternoon), as a polite way of saying this might avoid the moneys copulating with genetically incompatible partners – tamarins of another species. As tamarins presumably do not themselves have a formal biological species concept, they will not avoid coupling with an animal from a different species on the grounds that they cannot breed and so it would be ineffective. They indulge in sexual activity in response to instinctive drives, rather than in response to deliberate family planning decisions. That is, we might safely assume these couplings are about sexual attraction rather than a desire to have children.

I think that was what Jürgen Habermas may have meant when he wrote that:

"…the reproduction of every individual organism seems to warrant the assumption of purposiveness without purposeful activity…"

In terms of fitness, an animal is clearly more likely to have offspring if it is attracted to a sexually comparable partner than a non-compatible one. Breeding is clearly important for the survival of the species, and uses precious resources. Matings that could not lead to pregnancy (or, perhaps worse from a resource perspective, might lead to infertile hybrids that need to be nurtured but then fail to produce 'grandchildren'), would reduce breeding success overall in the populations. Assuming that a tamarin is more likely to be attracted to a member of a different species when it does not look so different from its own kind, it is those monkeys in the two groups that look most alike who are likely to be inadvertently sharing intimate moments with biologically incompatible partners.

A teleological explanation

Dr Dunn's suggestion that "quite often [the two species] become more distinct than you would expect them to, to avoid breeding with one another" sounds like teleology. That is, it seems to imply that there is a purpose (to avoid inter-breeding) and the "species actually diverge in their traits" in order to bring about this goal. This would be a teleological explanation.

(Read about 'Teleology')

I suspect the actual explanation is not that the two species "come more distinct…to avoid breeding with one another" but rather than they come more distinct because they cannot breed with each other, and so there is a selection advantage favouring the most distinct members of the two different species (if they are indeed less likely than their less distinguishable conspecifics to couple with allospecific mates).

I also suspect that Dr Dunn does not actually subscribe to the teleological argument, but is using a common way of talking that biologists often adopt as a kind of abbreviated argument: biologists know that when they refer to evolution having a purpose (e.g., to avoid cross-breeding), that is only a figure of speech.

Comprehension versus accuracy?

However, I am not sure that is always so obvious to non-specialists listening to them. Learners often find natural selection a challenging topic, and many would be quite happy with accepting that adaptations may have a purpose (rather than just a consequence). This reflects a common challenge of communicating science – either in formal teaching or supporting public understanding.

The teacher or science communicator simplifies accounts and uses everyday ways of expressing ideas that an audience without specialist knowledge can readily engage with to help 'make the unfamiliar familiar'. However, the simplifications and approximations and short-cuts we use to make sure what is said can be understood (i.e., made sense of) by non-specialists also risks us being misunderstood.

Albert Einstein and John the Baptist

Keith S. Taber

What is the relationship between Albert Einstein and St. John the Baptist?

Why would someone seeking to communicate scientific ideas to a broad readership refer to St. John?

Spoiler alert: in a direct sense, there clearly is no relationship. St. John lived in Palestine two thousand years ago, was a preacher, and is not known to have had any particular interest in what we think of as physics or science more generally. Albert Einstein was a theoretical physicist, and probably the most famous scientist of the twentieth century, perhaps of all time.

It is fair to point out both were Jewish: John can be considered a Jewish prophet. There has been much speculation on Einstein's religious thought. Of Jewish background, he was subject to the Nazi's fascist policies in Germany and fled to spent much of his life in the U.S.A. Sometimes considered an atheist, Einstein did talk of God (as not playing dice for example – that is, not leaving room in the Universe for completely random events) but it is sometimes claimed he use the idea of God as a metaphor for some kind of pantheistic or general spiritual background to the universe. In general though, he stuck to physics, and campaigned on issues like world peace.

(Read about 'The relationship between science and religion')

So, why raise the question?

My posing this question was motivated by reading something written by Herman Weyl (1885 – 1955) who is described by Wikipedia as "a German mathematician, theoretical physicist and philosopher". In one of his writings Weyl referred to Hendrik Lorentz who (again according to Wikipedia) was "a Dutch physicist who shared the 1902 Nobel Prize in Physics with Pieter Zeeman for the discovery and theoretical explanation of the Zeeman effect".

This is how Weyl described Lorentz:

"the Dutch physicist H.A. Lorentz who, as Einstein's John the Baptist, prepared the way for the gospel of relativity."

Weyl, 1952/2016, pp.131-132.

Those studying physics at high levels, or reading about relativity theory, will probably have heard of the 'Lorentz transformations' that are used in calculations in special relativity.

An extended metaphor?

What Weyl is doing here is using a metaphor, or perhaps an analogy. In a metaphor a writer or speaker says that something is something else – to imply it has some attribute of that other thing.

(Read about 'Science metaphors')

In an analogy, one system is compared with another to show that there is, or to suggest that perhaps might be, a structural similarity. Usually analogies are presented as an explicit comparison (X is like Y: i.e., rather than 'Lorentz was Einstein's John the Baptist', perhaps 'Lorentz was like Einstein's John the Baptist in the sense that…')

(Read about 'Science analogies')

As Weyl does not say Lorentz was like a John the baptist figure, or played a role similar to John the Baptist, but that he was "Einstein's John the Baptist" I would consider this a metaphor. However, it is an extended metaphor as the comparison is explained as justified because Lorentz "prepared the way for the gospel of relativity".

That could be seen as a second metaphor in that relativity is normally considered a theory (or two theories, special relativity, and general relativity), and not a gospel – a word that means 'good news'. So Weyl is saying that Lorentz prepared the way for the good news of relativity!

Making the familiar unfamiliar?

When I read this comment I immediately felt I appreciated the point that Weyl was seeking to make. However, I also felt that this was a rather odd comparison to make, as I was not sure how universally it would be understood.

Those communicating about science, whether as science teachers or journalists or (as here) scientists themselves looking to reach a general audience, have the task of 'making the unfamiliar (what people do not yet know about, and may indeed seem odd) familiar'. There are various techniques that can be used, and often these involve some form of comparison of what is being told about with something that is in some ways similar, and which is already familiar to the audience.

(Read about 'Making the unfamiliar familiar')

I attended 'Sunday school' from a young age (I think before starting day school if I recall correctly) at a London City Mission church, and later at a Methodist Church, where I became a Sunday school teacher before i went off to University. I therefore learnt quite a bit about Christianity. Anyone with such a background will have learnt that John the Baptist was a cousin of Jesus Christ, who preached 'the coming of the Lord' (i.e., the Jewish messiah, identified in Christianity with Jesus), and baptised Jesus in the River Jordan as he set out on his mission as a preacher and healer. John is said to have told his congregation to "prepare ye, the way of the Lord!" (the title of a song in the musical 'Godspell').

Someone knowing about Christianity in this way (regardless of whether they accept Christian teaching, or even the historical accuracy of the Baptism story) would likely immediately appreciate that just as John prepared the way for Jesus' ministry in first Century (CE) Palestine, so, according to Weyl, Lorentz prepared physics, laid important groundwork, for Einstein's work on relativity.

When you have the necessary background, such comparisons work effectively and quickly – the idea is communicated without the reader having to puzzle over and interpret the expressions "Einstein's John the Baptist" and "gospel of relativity" or deliberate on what is meant by 'preparing the way'. That is, the if the reader has the relevant 'interpretive resources' then understanding is an automatic process that does not require any conscious effort.

Culture-specific interpretive resources?

But I wondered what someone would make of this phrase ('Einstein's John the Baptist') if they did not have knowledge of the Bible stories? After all, in many parts of the world most people are not Christians, and may have little or no knowledge of Christian traditions. Did Weyl just assume everyone would have the background to appreciate his comparison, or did he assume he was only writing for an audience in certain parts of the world where this was common knowledge?

Certainly, as teachers, our attempts to help our students understand abstract ideas by making references to common cultural phenomena can fall flat if the learners are not familiar with those phenomena. It is counter-productive if the teacher has to interrupt their presentation on some abstract idea to explain the very comparison that was meant to help explain the scientific concept or principle. If you have no idea who 'John the Baptist' was, in what sense he 'prepared the way' for Jesus, or or how the term 'Gospel' came to be attached to the accounts of Jesus' life, then it is not so easy to appreciate what Lorentz was to Einstein's work from Weyl's prose. We can only make the unfamiliar familiar by using cultural references when we share those references with those we are communicating with.

Work cited:

Weyl, H. (1952/2016). Symmetry (New Princeton Science Library edition ed.). Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.

We can't handle the scientific truth

"If the muscles and other cells of the body burn sugar instead of oxygen…"

Do they think we cannot handle the scientific truth?

I should really have gone to bed, but I was just surfing the channels in case there was some 'must watch' programme I might miss, and I came across a screening of the film 'A few good men'. This had been a very popular movie at one time, and I seem to recall watching it with my late wife. I remembered it as an engaging film, and as an example of the 'courtroom drama' genre: but beyond that I could really only remember Tom Cruise as defence advocate questioning Jack Nicholson's as a commanding officer – and the famous line from Nicholson – "You can't handle the truth!".

This became something of a meme – I suspect now there are a lot of people who 'know' and use that line, who have never even seen the film and may not know what they are quoting from.

So, I though I might watch a bit, to remind myself what the actual case was about. In brief, a marine stationed at the U.S. Guantánamo Bay naval base and detention camp had died at the hands of two of his comrades. They had not intended to kill, but admitted mistreating him – their defence was they were simply obeying orders in subjecting a colleague who was not measuring up, and was letting the unit down, to some unpleasant, but ultimately (supposedly) harmless, punishment.

The film does not contain a lot of science, but what struck me was the failure to get some science that was invoked right. I was so surprised at what I thought I'd heard being presented as science, that I went back and replayed a section, and I then decided to see if I could find the script (by Aaron Sorkin*, screenplay adapted from his own theatre play) on the web, to see if what was said had actually been written into the script.

One of the witnesses is a doctor who is asked by the prosecuting counsel to explain lactic acidosis.

Burning sugar instead of oxygen?

The characters here are:

Capt. Jack Ross (played by Kevin Bacon) the prosecuting counsel,

Dr. Stone (Christopher Guest) and

Lt. Daniel Kaffee (Cruise's character).

On direct examination:

Ross: Dr. Stone, what's lactic acidosis?

Stone: If the muscles and other cells of the body burn sugar instead of oxygen, lactic acid is produced. That lactic acid is what caused Santiago's lungs to bleed.

Ross: How long does it take for the muscles and other cells to begin burning sugar instead of oxygen?

Stone: Twenty to thirty minutes.

Ross: And what caused Santiago's muscles and other cells to start burning sugar? [In the film, the line seems to be: And what caused this process to be speed up in Santiago's muscles?]

Stone: An ingested poison of some kind.

Later, under cross-examination

Kafee: Commander, if I had a coronary condition, and a perfectly clean rag was placed in my mouth, and the rag was accidentally pushed too far down, is it possible that my cells would continue burning sugar after the rag was taken out?

Stone: It would have to be a very serious condition.

What?

If a student suggested that lactic acid is produced when the muscles burn sugar instead of oxygen we would likely consider this an alternative conception (misconception). It is, at best, a clumsy phrasing, and is simply wrong.

Respiration

Metabolism is a set of processes under very fine controls, so whether we should refer to metabolism as burning or not, is a moot point. Combustion tends to be a vigorous process that is usually uncontrolled. But we can see it as a metaphor: carbohydrates are 'burnt' up in the sense that they undergo reactions analogous to burning.

But burning requires oxygen (well, in the lab. we might burn materials in chlorine, but, in general, and in everyday life, combustion is a reaction with oxygen), so what could burning oxygen mean?

In respiration, glucose is in effect reacted with oxygen to produce carbon dioxide and water. However, this is not a single step process, but a complex set of smaller reactions – the overall effect of which is

glucose + oxygen → carbon dioxide + water

Breaking glucose down to lactic acid also acts as an energy source, but is no where near as effective. Our muscles can undertake this ('anaerobic') process when there is insufficient oxygen supply – for example when undertaking high stamina exercise – but this is best seen as a temporary stop-gap, as lactic acid build up causes problems (cramp for example) – even if not usually death.

Does science matter?

Now clearly the science is not central to the story of 'A few good men'. The main issues are (factual)

whether the accused men were acting under orders;

(ethical)

the nature of illegal orders,
when service personal should question and ignore orders (deontology) given that they seldom have the whole picture (and in this film one of the accused men is presented as something of a simpleton who viewer may suspect should not be given much responsibility for decision making),
whether it is acceptable to use corporal or cruel punishment on an under-performing soldier (or marine) given that the lives of many may depend upon their high levels of performance (consequentialism, or perhaps pragmatics)…

There is also a medical issue, regarding whether the torture of the soldier was the primary cause of death, or whether there was an underlying health issue which the medical officer (Stone) had missed and which might also explain the poor performance. [That is a theme which featured large in a recent very high profile real murder case.]

Otherwise the film is about the characters of, and relationships among, the legal officers. Like most good films – this is film about people, and being human in the world, and how we behave towards and relate to each other.

The nature of lactic acidosis is hardly a key point.

But if it is worth including in the script as the assumed cause of death, and its nature relevant – why not get the science right?

Perhaps, because science is complicated and needs to be simplified for the cinema-goer who, after all, wants to be entertained, not lectured?

Perhaps there is no simple account of lactic acidosis which could be included in the script without getting technical, and entering into a long and complicated explanation.

In teaching science…

But surely that is not true. In teaching we often have to employ simplifications which ignore complexity and nuance for the benefit of getting the core idea across to learners. We seek the optimal level of simplification that learners can make good sense of, but which is true to the core essence of the actual science being discussed (it is 'intellectually honest') and provides a suitable basis for later more advanced treatments.

It can be hard to find that optimum level of simplification – but I really do not think that explaining lactic acidosis as burning sugar instead of oxygen could be considered a credit-worthy attempt.

Dr. Stone, can we try again?

What about, something like:

Dr. Stone, what's lactic acidosis?

It occurs when the body tissues do not have sufficient oxygen to fully break down sugar in the usual way, and damaging lactic aid is produced instead of carbon dioxide and water.

I am sure there are lots of possible tweaks here. The point is that the script did not need to go into a long medical lecture, but by including something that was simply nonsensical, and should be obviously wrong to anyone who had studied respiration at school (which should be everyone who has been to school in the past few decades in many countries), it distracts, and so detracts, from the story.

All images from 'A few good men' (1992, Columbia Pictures)

* I see that ("acclaimed screenwriter") Aaron Sorkin is planning a new live television version of 'A Few Good Men' – so perhaps the description of lactic acidosis can be updated?

Developing intellectual sophistication – but not in data services

Keith S. Taber

Dear Alka

Thank you for your email on the subject of 'Developing Intellectual Sophistication and Scientific Thinking–The Schemes of William G. Perry and Deanna Kuhn', a topic that is of some considerable interest to me. Indeed, amazingly, I have written on this very topic.

I understand you are trying to sell me some kind of data services – including 'Web Data Scraping' and 'Healthcare Data Mining' and even 'Medical billing' – which all sounds wonderful, even if I have no idea why I would want to make any use of (let alone pay you for) these services.

I was pleased to read that you provide "Data Scraping & Data Processing service provider with an immaculate track record of delivering services to clients in USA, Canada, Australia, UK and Europe."

I assume that 'data scraping' involves using machine algorithms to locate information on the web which can help locate and connect those who have common interests? I imagine that you have used you own "immaculate … services" to identify my article on 'Developing Intellectual Sophistication and Scientific Thinking–The Schemes of William G. Perry and Deanna Kuhn' as a tag line to get my attention and to identify me as someone who might have a need for and budget for buying into your services.

There is a convention shared among honest users of the internet which is that a subject line should relate to the content of an email – so an email with the subject heading "Developing Intellectual Sophistication and Scientific Thinking–The Schemes of William G. Perry and Deanna Kuhn' would be expected to have something to do with, well, developing intellectual sophistication and scientific thinking and/or the schemes of William G. Perry and Deanna Kuhn. As your email message body has no connection with the subject heading, this suggests that either:
a) your company is just not very good at extracting and interpreting data from the Internet, or
b) in common with most emails I get which try to attract my attention with irrelevant subject headers, your services are actually a scam – and that you have simply sent messages to a vast number of email addresses hoping that some of the recipients may actually have some use for such services and be willing to send you money.

After all, if your organisation had any competence in data processing services, I imagine it would not be targeting a retired academic with services such as 'medical billing' which clearly have absolutely no relevance.

Yours,

Keith

An honest reply

Shortly after I fired off the reply above, and then posted it here, I received a personal response (and apology) assuring me that the company are genuinely seeking to offer their services and working hard to build up clientele – not out to scam anyone. Had this had been a scam I imagine they would have just ignored my response as the process works by sending out blanket emailing (to as many addresses as possible) and then identifying potential 'marks' (people susceptible to parting with their money) from any responses to focus on. Other responses would just be ignored, as (unlike a genuine business that would be expected to respond to all genuine correspondence) scammers focus their energy on the most likely targets. So I am happy to accept this was just ill-judged, rather than anything underhand.

[I have noticed that the footer of the original email told me "This email may contain information that is privileged, confidential or otherwise protected from disclosure. It may not be used by, or its contents copied or disclosed to, persons other than the address(ees)" so it seems I should not have shared it here – but then sending out unsolicited emails with such claims is another questionable practice that I've commented on before: 'It's a secret conference invitation: pass it on…'.]