Investigation of gifted students' epistemological beliefs, Self-Efficacy beliefs and use of metacognition1

Abstract

The aim of this study is to examine how well gifted students' self-efficacy beliefs and epistemological beliefs (justification, development and source/certainty) predict their metacognition use at solving science problem. For this purpose, Epistemological Beliefs Questionnaire, Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire, and Metacognitive Activities Inventory were administered to 81 gifted students. Descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis were conducted. Results showed that gifted students strongly believe that knowledge changes and critical examination of evidence causes construction of knowledge. They also believe that the source of knowledge is the learners themselves and there is more than one correct. Moreover, gifted students appear to be self-efficacious in science learning and they use metacognition at science problem solving. In addition, the gifted students who feel self-efficacious in science and who believe that scientific knowledge can change, and it is constructed via critically judging evidence and experts' opinions tend to use metacognition at higher levels while solving science problems. Based on these findings, some suggestions were made for teachers to be able to help students to use their metacognition more effectively in science classes.