Seeing the Forest through the Trees Using Network Analysis: Exploring Student Responses to Conceptual Physics Questions

This study explored how scientific ideas interacted in college students’ scientific explanations using text analysis techniques and network analysis. A task was given to first-year college students asking them to answer a series of physics questions associated with a computer simulation. Students’ written responses were classified into three models—non-normative, mixed, and normative—and then subjected to text analysis using IBM SPSS Modeler...