Biology teachers' views on the concept of cancer: A socio-scientific study

The aim of this research was to determine the opinions of biology teachers about the concept of cancer. The study was carried out with case study from qualitative research methods. The study group of the study consisted of 45 biology teachers working in Balıkesir in the spring semester of the 2021-2022 academic year. The data were collected with 3 data collection tools developed by the researcher. These were: Demographic Information Form, Cancer Word Association Form and Scenario Based Cancer Opinion Form. Data were analyzed according to descriptive and content analyses techniques. The study results showed that the biology teachers' awareness about cancer was high and their cognitive concepts about cancer were mostly affected by the concepts in the secondary biology curriculum. It has been determined that teachers had mostly negative perceptions about cancer and that their knowledge about cancer was sufficient, but they were insufficient in terms of knowing new treatment methods and screening methods. It has been observed that teachers were not fully understood and had negative thoughts about the use of vaccines for protection from cancer-causing viruses and genetic screening programs. It has been observed that the negative perception about cancer was mostly obtained from outside the curriculum and the environment in which it lived. As a result of this research, in addition to the achievements in the biology curriculum, some suggestions were made about cancer in the biology curriculum.