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A survey was developed to probe student understanding of quantum mechanics at the beginning of graduate instruction. The survey was administered to 202 physics graduate students enrolled in first-year quantum mechanics courses from seven…
Formally investigating the sources of students' difficulties around specific subjects is crucial for developing appropriate strategies to help students. We have been studying difficulties in understanding magnetism encountered by students…
The purpose of this brief note is that of discussing the meaning of the uncertainty relations involving energy and time in quantum mechanics by means of a reading of the classical works on the subject. This was written for undergraduate…
Common research tasks ask students to identify a correct answer and justify their answer choice. We propose expanding the array of research tasks to access different knowledge that students might have. By asking students to discuss answers…
Although researchers have extensively studied student conceptions of radioactivity, the conceptions held by pre-service teachers on this subject are largely absent from the literature. We conducted a qualitative content analysis of…
Measurement uncertainty and experimental error are important concepts taught in undergraduate physics laboratories. Although student ideas about error and uncertainty in introductory classical mechanics lab experiments have been studied…
We describe the difficulties that advanced undergraduate and graduate students have with quantum measurement within the standard interpretation of quantum mechanics. We explore the possible origins of these difficulties by analyzing student…
Gaining recognition as a physics person by peers is an important contributor to undergraduate students' physics identity and their success in physics courses. Previous research has separately demonstrated that women perceive less…
We developed a survey to probe student understanding of quantum mechanics concepts at the beginning of graduate instruction. The survey was administered to 202 graduate students in physics enrolled in first-year quantum mechanics courses…
Students' attitudes and approaches to problem solving in physics can profoundly influence their motivation to learn and development of expertise. We developed and validated an Attitudes and Approaches to Problem Solving survey by expanding…
The existence of gender differences in student performance on conceptual assessments and their responses to attitudinal assessments has been repeatedly demonstrated. This difference is often present in students' preinstruction responses and…
Students entering engineering in universities of applied sciences were tested to see whether they understood easy Science problems within the first week of the first semester. The test comprised of mathematics and physics questions in both…
Energy concepts are fundamental across the sciences, yet these concepts can be fragmented along disciplinary boundaries, rather than integrated into a coherent whole. To teach physics effectively to biology students, we need to understand…
There has been an increasing trend of females performing better than males academically across the mathematical engineering courses. To confirm this assumption, final marks of two independent samples of students from Calculus courses across…
We explore the difficulties that advanced undergraduate and graduate students have with non-relativistic quantum mechanics of a single particle in one spatial dimension. To investigate these difficulties we developed a conceptual survey and…
This paper reports on the outcomes of a survey implemented in secondary schools. The survey identified the types of access and use of computers by students. It was found that the students had significant access to computers but they were…
On their way to an academic career in physics, Ph.D. students have to overcome difficulties at many levels. Beyond the intellectual challenge, there are also psychological, social and economic barriers. We studied the difficulties…
An analysis of barriers to women's participation in physics education is presented. It is expected that in undergraduate physics the most common situation for a women is that she is cisgender and one of a numerical minority in the…
We discuss an investigation of student difficulties with the corrections to the energy spectrum of the hydrogen atom for the intermediate field Zeeman effect using the degenerate perturbation theory. The investigation was carried out in…
We investigate student understanding of energy and momentum concepts at the level of introductory physics by designing and administering a 25-item multiple choice test and conducting individual interviews. We find that most students have…