Theses and Dissertations at Montana State University (MSU)
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Item The science writing heuristic in online education(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2020) Devine, Aaron Robert; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Greg FrancisThe author conducted a classroom research project to see whether instruction with the Science Writing Heuristic (SWH) in an online setting would increase evidence for critical thinking in the writing of his students. One unit was taught, and its final writing project was scored with a rubric that assessed critical thinking. Lab reports which were written before the SWH treatment unit was taught were also scored with the critical thinking rubric. Scores were compared and analyzed to ascertain whether the writing after the treatment showed an increase in critical thinking. The author found that there was a significant increase in scores after the treatment. The author concluded that, for a variety of reasons, the score on the final writing project was higher than the score on the previously written work. The author also asked whether using the SWH would increase student confidence in science class and gathered evidence by collecting and evaluating student work, interviewing students, and gathering survey results before and after the treatment. There was evidence that in several aspects of science class, student confidence was boosted. Finally, it was asked whether using the SWH would increase student enjoyment of science class. The same sources of information were used to evaluate whether this happened, and the results were inconclusive on this front.Item Scalable solutions to the carbon capture infrastructure problem(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Engineering, 2020) Whitman, Caleb; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Sean YawCO 2 capture and storage (CCS) is a climate change mitigation strategy that aims to reduce the amount of CO 2 vented into the atmosphere from industrial processes. Designing cost-effective CCS infrastructure is critical to meeting CO 2 emission reduction targets and is a computationally challenging problem. CCS infrastructure design is a generalization of the capacitated fixed charge network flow problem, CFCNF. CFCNF is NP-hard with no known approximation algorithms. In our work, we design three novel heuristics to solve CCS. We evaluate all heuristics on real life CCS infrastructure design data and find that they quickly generate solutions close to optimal. Decreasing the time it takes to determine CCS infrastructure designs will support national-level scenarios, undertaking risk and sensitivity assessments, and understanding the impact of government policies (e.g. 45Q tax credits for CCS).Item On a heuristic point of view concerning social media news and secondary teachers(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Education, Health & Human Development, 2018) Johnson, Spencer Theadore; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Ann EwbankCertain cues used by a consumer of news can trigger heuristics that help determine whether information is credible (Metzger, 2007; Sundar, Knobloch?Westerwick, & Hastall, 2007). This study addresses which cues secondary teachers perceive as effective when assessing the credibility of news on social media. The purpose of this study is to determine how secondary teachers rate cues in order of importance when evaluating the credibility of news obtained in the context of social media. The participants in this study were secondary teachers in a northwest state who teach about online information credibility. A survey adapted from the Kids and Credibility Study (Flanagin, Metzger, & Hartsell, 2010) asked secondary teachers to rate the importance of 23 credibility cues or heuristics commonly found in social media news posts. A principal components analysis revealed three components that are a composite of heuristics reflected in the literature (Beavers et al., 2013). The resulting components were named Endorsement, Reputation & Confirmation, and Low Level Endorsement respectively. By using a sum scores comparison, the composites of heuristics were ordered by perceived level of credibility (DiStefano, Zhu, & Mindrila, 2009; Grace-Martin, 2016). Reputation & Confirmation rated highest on the scale as indicators of credibility, Endorsement ranked second, and Low Level Endorsement ranked last. The results of the study indicate that secondary teachers believe that the most effective heuristics while using low to medium cognitive effort for assessing news credibility are the reputation of the author of the information, along with confirming the information from another source to make a quality judgment on the factual nature of the source. Social endorsements (such as 'likes' and 'shares') on social media play an important role in determining credibility; however, secondary teachers indicate that they perceive Reputation and Consistency to be better at indicating credibility. This study illuminates the role heuristics play in credibility decisions when evaluating news found in a social media setting.Item Beyond rational judgment : a test of the affect heuristic hypothesis(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2002) Richmond, Aaron SargentItem The effect of incorporating the science writing heuristic approach to inquiry activities in a high school science classroom(Montana State University - Bozeman, Graduate School, 2013) Egan, Lori Ann; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Peggy Taylor.Students often come to a high school science classes without the skills they need to be successful in an inquiry based science class. These skills include the ability to write about science procedures and findings, read about and connect science content, and work collaboratively through science inquiry processes. This research used the Science Writing Heuristic to provide students with a template for inquiry based activities. With the SWH, students worked collaboratively on in inquiry based activity and then wrote about the science they did including procedures, observations, data, and results. Students then compared their findings with the findings of other groups. They used this information to make a claim about the content and supported the claim with evidence or data. Students were then asked to make a connection between the content and the activity through a reading assignment that explained the concept further, described a model of the content, or was a real-world application of the content. The goal of SWH was to improve students' understanding of science by reading, writing and collaborating about science. After a nine week pre-treatment and treatment phase data was collected to compare the skills students had gained and to determine if their understanding of science content had improved. Various methods were used to collect and analyze data including student surveys, field notes with observations about student collaboration, exam, quiz and lab grades, and a teacher reflective journal. Based on the data gathered, the students' ability to collaborate improved and they learned more through guided collaborative work. Student quiz grades did not change based on the SWH template, but exam grades did improve. The reading component of the SWH template did not produce the results I expected and students did not relate the reading to any of the content questions and many students did not read the assignments. In conclusion, the SWH approach provided me with information I can use as a teacher in the future. Despite the approach not being a complete success, parts of it can be used to help increase the skills students need to be successful in a science classroom.