Predicting genetics achievement in nonmajors college biology

Students enrolled in a non-majors college biology course were pretested to determine their level of intellectual development, degree of field independence, mental capacity, amount of prior genetics knowledge, and amount of fluid intelligence. They were then taught a unit on Mendelian genetics. The only student variables found to not account for a significant amount of variance on a test of reading comprehension and/or a test of genetics achievement was amount of prior genetics knowledge. Developmental level was found to be the most consistent predictor of performance, suggesting that a lack of general hypothetico-deductive reasoning ability is a major factor limiting achievement among these students.

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