Development of a Scale on Scientific Epistemological Views and Investigation of Epistemological Views of Prospective Teachers

The aim of this research was to develop avalid and reliable measurement tool (SSEV) for the determination of theepistemological views of prospective teachers, and to use this scale to elicitthe epistemological views of prospective teachers in Turkey. The applicationwas conducted with 930 participants. SSEV was found to account for 48% of thetotal variance in the participants’ epistemological views. SSEV consisted ofthree sub-dimensions; “authority and accuracy in scientific knowledge”,“methodological approach and scientific attitude”, and “nature of scientificknowledge”. The ω, r, and α reliability coefficients for the whole scale werefound to be .868, .838 and .861, respectively. In terms of the results it canbe stated that SSEV is a valid and reliable scale to measure teachercandidates’ epistemological views. The prospective teachers that constitutedthe sample of this research generally had mature epistemological views at aslightly higher level than moderate. It was found that the developed/matureepistemological views of the participants were at a high level for theauthority and accuracy sub-dimension, above the moderate level for themethodological approaches and scientific attitude, and at a moderate level fornature of scientific knowledge.