Examination of the relationship of secondary students energy literacy with scientific epistemological beliefs and demographic variables

This thesis study aims to examine the relationship between secondary school students' energy literacy and scientific epistemological beliefs and different variables such as gender, school position and parental education level. The sample comprised 702 students in the 7th grade in the public schools of 13 districts of Mugla province in the 2020-2021 academic year. "Energy Literacy Scale" and "Scientific Epistemological Beliefs Scale" were used as data collection tools. The "Energy Literacy Scale" was developed by DeWaters, Qaqish, Graham and Powers (2013) and adapted into Turkish by Güven, Yakar and Sülün (2019). The "Epistemological Beliefs Scale" was developed by Elder (1999) to measure the scientific epistemological beliefs of primary school students and adapted to Turkish by Acat, Tüken and Karadağ (2010). In the analysis of the data obtained in the research, different statistical tests such as independent groups t-test, one-way analysis of variance and correlation analysis were performed. The research showed that students who got the highest score from the sub-dimensions of the energy literacy scale, self-perception and higher from the affective and behavioral dimension scored low from the cognitive dimension. They also had the highest score from the sub-dimensions of the scientific epistemological beliefs scale. In energy literacy in terms of the gender variable, there is a significant difference between female and male students in terms of self-perception and behavioral sub-dimensions. There seems to be a significant difference between the sub-dimensions of authority and accuracy, source of knowledge and reasoning. When the effect of the school location variable was examined, a significant difference was observed in the cognitive sub-dimension between the students studying in the center of energy literacy and in the villages. There was also a difference in the sub-dimension of authority and accuracy in scientific epistemological beliefs. When the effect of the mother's and father's education level variable was examined, a significant difference was observed in the cognitive dimension in energy literacy. A significant difference was also found in the sub-dimensions of the mother's and father's education variable in scientific epistemological beliefs. A statistically significant positive relationship between the students' energy literacy sub-dimensions and scientific epistemological beliefs sub-dimensions was identified. When the results of the scientific epistemological beliefs sub-dimensions' level of predicting the energy literacy sub-dimensions were examined, it was determined that some of the scientific epistemological beliefs sub-dimensions were a significant predictor of the energy literacy sub-dimensions.