Over the years, research on students' epistemological beliefs has resulted in a growing common understanding but there are still some major points of discussion. Especially, the lack of consensus on the context-general and/or context-specific nature of epistemological beliefs deserves our attention. We argue that research in the field today is mainly characterized by a top-down approach that investigates students' domain-specific beliefs from a general epistemological perspective. Alternatively, we report on one of our studies as well as some other research that takes a bottom-up approach starting from students' domain-specific belief systems and analyzing their epistemic dimensions. Results of these studies point to the highly domain-specific nature of students' beliefs about knowledge and knowing. Therefore, a conceptual distinction between students' general epistemological beliefs and the epistemic dimensions of domain-related belief systems is recommended as a more appropriate way to address the context-general–context-specific discussion on epistemological beliefs.
%0 Journal Article
%1 citeulike:2085087
%A Opteynde, P.
%A Decorte, E.
%A Verschaffel, L.
%D 2006
%J International Journal of Educational Research
%K belief_systems epistemiology mathematics
%N 1-2
%P 57--70
%R 10.1016/j.ijer.2006.08.004
%T Epistemic dimensions of students' mathematics-related belief systems
%U http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2006.08.004
%V 45
%X Over the years, research on students' epistemological beliefs has resulted in a growing common understanding but there are still some major points of discussion. Especially, the lack of consensus on the context-general and/or context-specific nature of epistemological beliefs deserves our attention. We argue that research in the field today is mainly characterized by a top-down approach that investigates students' domain-specific beliefs from a general epistemological perspective. Alternatively, we report on one of our studies as well as some other research that takes a bottom-up approach starting from students' domain-specific belief systems and analyzing their epistemic dimensions. Results of these studies point to the highly domain-specific nature of students' beliefs about knowledge and knowing. Therefore, a conceptual distinction between students' general epistemological beliefs and the epistemic dimensions of domain-related belief systems is recommended as a more appropriate way to address the context-general–context-specific discussion on epistemological beliefs.
@article{citeulike:2085087,
abstract = {{Over the years, research on students' epistemological beliefs has resulted in a growing common understanding but there are still some major points of discussion. Especially, the lack of consensus on the context-general and/or context-specific nature of epistemological beliefs deserves our attention. We argue that research in the field today is mainly characterized by a top-down approach that investigates students' domain-specific beliefs from a general epistemological perspective. Alternatively, we report on one of our studies as well as some other research that takes a bottom-up approach starting from students' domain-specific belief systems and analyzing their epistemic dimensions. Results of these studies point to the highly domain-specific nature of students' beliefs about knowledge and knowing. Therefore, a conceptual distinction between students' general epistemological beliefs and the epistemic dimensions of domain-related belief systems is recommended as a more appropriate way to address the context-general–context-specific discussion on epistemological beliefs.}},
added-at = {2010-11-30T22:39:03.000+0100},
author = {Opteynde, P. and Decorte, E. and Verschaffel, L.},
biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/250ac823485eae63f5cbd9242e40734c1/smatthiesen},
citeulike-article-id = {2085087},
citeulike-linkout-0 = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2006.08.004},
citeulike-linkout-1 = {http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0883035506000905},
citeulike-linkout-2 = {http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6VDF-4M27X0J-1/2/4488857b6064e23f0146b5c663c6975d},
doi = {10.1016/j.ijer.2006.08.004},
interhash = {20b351b8c8b881328abd95f1fac1828d},
intrahash = {50ac823485eae63f5cbd9242e40734c1},
issn = {08830355},
journal = {International Journal of Educational Research},
keywords = {belief_systems epistemiology mathematics},
number = {1-2},
pages = {57--70},
posted-at = {2010-08-18 06:44:04},
priority = {1},
timestamp = {2010-12-02T14:32:44.000+0100},
title = {{Epistemic dimensions of students' mathematics-related belief systems}},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2006.08.004},
volume = 45,
year = 2006
}