Secondary students’ epistemic thinking and year as predictors of critical source evaluation of Internet blogs

Abstract

Students should develop competent epistemic thinking and critical source evaluation skills during secondary education. This study compared these skills and their interrelation between Australian students (n = 218) from Years 7, 9, and 11. In an online questionnaire, students critically evaluated the Trustworthiness of four fictitious Internet blog posts that varied in Reliability (reliable vs. unreliable) and Content (pro vs. contra computer games). They also completed an Epistemic Thinking Assessment, resulting in scores on Absolutism, Multiplism, and Evaluativism. Results show no significant differences between Years in Epistemic Thinking, but significant Year differences in Trustworthiness judgments: Year 9 and 11 students discriminated between reliable and unreliable blog posts while Year 7 students failed to do so. Additionally, not only being in Year 7 but also holding Multiplist beliefs (e.g., “everything is subjective”) predicted poor source evaluation skills. Potential explanations and implications for teaching practice will be discussed.