Different statements for the same problem: different problems?

Abstract

This study presents a description of students' actions after reading the statement for the same thermodynamic situation in different formats. University students of Biology were taken as an accidental sample (N=56). The formats employed are of the kind that the students usually work with during their instruction. The representational analysis is made by means of a distributed cognition approach that regards the external representation as an indispensable part of the representational system. Results show that certain characteristics of these statements can be related to the actions that the students undertake while they solve the problem.

Keywords

• problem solving
• thermodynamics
• external representations