An Analysis of middle school students' perspectives about socio-scientific issues

Nuclear power plants, stem cells, influenza vaccines, cloning, sugar testing for pregnant women, genetically modified foods, cosmetic surgery, global warming, cholesterol drugs and organ transplants affect daily life and social life. For some of these issues, there are different judgments and judgments about whether individuals should exist or not. Sometimes individuals have to choose and do this when they come across these issues. In this selection process, the state of the individual's cognitive structure is important. If the individual has a scientific literacy and has a high scientific attitude, his approach to such socio-scientific issues will be different from that of individuals with other characteristics. At this stage, it is important to examine the relationship between students' scientific attitudes and their approach to socio-scientific issues. Students 'perspectives on socio-scientific issues vary depending on their parents' educational status, gender, cognitive mind structures and learning from life. For this reason, in this study, it is aimed to examine the level of scientific attitudes of secondary school students and the factors that affect it and the perspectives of students with different scientific attitudes towards socio-scientific issues. For this purpose, "Scientific Attitude Scale" and "Soyo-Scientific Subjects Evaluation Form" were applied to the students. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected together and a mixed research design was used. According to the quantitative findings obtained from the research; scientific attitudes of the students who participated in the research were determined. There was no significant difference between the students' scientific attitude levels, gender, parents' education level, parents' occupation types and family income level. According to the qualitative findings obtained from the research; It was determined that students with high scientific attitude among the students who participated in the research had more information and opinions about socio-scientific issues.