The significance of knowledge in learning: a psychologically informed analysis of higher education students' perceptions

Effie Maclellan, Rebecca Soden

    Research output: Contribution to journal › Article

    Abstract

    The emergence of what is increasingly becoming known as the knowledge age implies that higher education should prepare students to be, primarily, knowledge workers. This proposition triggered a small scale study in which structured interviews were carried out with 25 second-year undergraduates registered for a psychology module on motivational theory. The purpose of the interview was to discern students’ views on the features of dialogue/talk and of student study behaviour that help them to develop usable knowledge. The dominant finding was that students did not perceive their learning to be facilitated through being required to be cognitively active in processing new information. Rather, they perceived their learning to be most effective when new knowledge was made available to them. The findings are discussed in terms of the complexity of the prior knowledge base on which the success of constructivist approaches depends.
    LanguageEnglish
    Number of pages18
    JournalInternational Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
    Volume1
    Issue number1
    Publication statusPublished - 2007

    Fingerprint

    learning
    education
    student
    study behavior
    interview
    knowledge
    psychology
    dialogue
    worker

    Keywords

    • knowledge
    • learning
    • education
    • higher education

    Cite this

    Maclellan, Effie ; Soden, Rebecca. / The significance of knowledge in learning : a psychologically informed analysis of higher education students' perceptions. In: International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning . 2007 ; Vol. 1, No. 1.
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    Maclellan, E & Soden, R 2007, 'The significance of knowledge in learning: a psychologically informed analysis of higher education students' perceptions' International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning , vol. 1, no. 1.

    The significance of knowledge in learning : a psychologically informed analysis of higher education students' perceptions. / Maclellan, Effie; Soden, Rebecca.

    In: International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning , Vol. 1, No. 1, 2007.

    Research output: Contribution to journal › Article

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    Maclellan E, Soden R. The significance of knowledge in learning: a psychologically informed analysis of higher education students' perceptions. International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning . 2007;1(1).

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