Investigating the relationship between pre-service science teachers' self-efficacy and epistemological beliefs about physics

In this study, it was aimed to investigate the relationship between demographic characteristics, physics-related self-efficacy and scientific epistemological beliefs of prospective teachers attending the Science Teacher Education program at The Dokuz Eylul University, Buca Education Faculty. The research was carried out in the fall semester of the 2019-2020 academic year, with the participation of teacher candidates who continue to the science teaching program at Dokuz Eylül University Buca Education Faculty. This study aims to measure physics self-efficacy and scientific epistemological beliefs of pre-service science teachers. 257 pre-service teachers participated in the study. Quantitative data collection tools were used in the study. The data of the study, which was conducted with the screening method, were collected by Adams et al. (2006) "The Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey" and the "Colorado Physics and Physics Epistemological Belief (COFFEI)" scale adapted by Şahin (2010) and Alpaslan (2017) developed by Lin and Tsai (2013). The "Physics Self-Efficacy Scale" adapted to Turkish by (2016) was used. The two mentioned scales are Likert-type and reliable and valid scales in the relevant field. As a result of the study, it was concluded that there is a positive relationship between the physics self-efficacy of the preservice science teachers and their epistemological beliefs about learning physics. A statistically significant difference was found between self-efficacy and epistemological beliefs about physics by gender. According to classes, a statistically significant difference was found for physics self-efficacy. As student individuals increase over the years, their pedagogical content knowledge increases and they take courses, their self-efficacy in the field of science has increased. It has been observed that the scores of the individuals who are 3rd and 4th grade teacher candidates are much higher than the scores of the 1st grade teacher candidates. No statistically significant difference was found in the scores of physics learning and physics-related epistemological beliefs according to grades. According to academic achievement averages, statistically significant differences were found in epistemology belief scores related to physics learning and physics self-efficacy. It has been observed that very successful and successful pre-service teachers have much higher epistemological beliefs and physics self-efficacy scores. Successful students have high epistemological beliefs and physical self-efficacy.