Abstract
Many students regard discrete spectra as a type of diffraction pattern, often conflating the minima and maxima for diffraction with the dark regions and bright lines in a discrete spectrum.
Highlights
This paper presents results from an investigation into student understanding of atomic emission spectra conducted in collaboration by the physics education groups at the University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia and the University of Washington (UW), Seattle, Washington, USA
We demonstrated difficulties students have in relating spectral lines to transitions of electrons between energy levels. [1,2] This paper focuses on another aspect—student understanding of the role of each component of the experimental setup in forming atomic spectra lines
The results presented in this paper are part of a broad investigation into student understanding of the atomic model used to relate discrete line spectra and electron transitions
Summary
This paper presents results from an investigation into student understanding of atomic emission spectra conducted in collaboration by the physics education groups at the University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia and the University of Washington (UW), Seattle, Washington, USA. Observations of the spectra (continuous and discrete) that result from various experimental setups and light sources lay the groundwork for understanding the important ideas of electron levels and quantization of energy. Students have previously observed the interference patterns that arise when light of a single wavelength (e.g., from a laser) passes through one, two, or more slits, including diffraction gratings They have observed the continuous spectrum that results when a thin beam of white light passes through a prism and is incident on a screen. (Sometimes a diffraction grating is used instead.) This observation motives the idea that white light consists of many wavelengths At this point, the light source is changed to a gas discharge tube (e.g., a fluorescent lamp) and students observe only a few discrete colored lines on the screen. Some of the students had completed laboratory experiments in which they had observed line spectra. (See Fig. 1 for a common demonstration or experiment used to observe atomic line spectra.)
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