Vargfrågan - Gymnasieelevers argumentation kring ett sociovetenskapligt dilemma. "The Wolf Issue - Upper Secondary Students’ Argumentation about a Socio-Scientific Issue."

The focus of this study is the attitudes towards wolves in Sweden among upper secondary students. This socio-scientific issue (SSI) involves many aspects, such as ethical, political and biological aspects, and provides a context to study students’ informal argumentation. The different arguments used by the students were analyzed using the framework of the SEE-SEP-model. A questionnaire probing attitudes to the existence of wolves in the neighbourhood was distributed to 352 upper secondary students. 18 students were interviewed in focused group-interviews (in pairs). The results showed that 55% of the students showed a negative attitude towards the existence of wolves in the neighbourhood. The analysis of the different aspects of arguments used by the students in the interviews showed that arguments based on value were more dominant (60%) than arguments based on knowledge(30%), and arguments based on personal experiences (10%).