STS Approach Research Articles

The articulation between the STS Approach and Environmental Education for the contextualization of Acoustics in Physics Teaching

Noise pollution presents itself in an invisible, dangerous, and permanent way, with long-lasting consequences. Acoustic discomfort within the school environment affects not only human health but also the quality of verbal communication and student performance. An appropriate acoustic environment contributes to the improvement of the teaching and learning process in addition to enhancing the interpersonal relationships involved in the educational process. Moreover, it is important to introduce acoustics-related subjects, such as environmental noise, into high school science and physics syllabi. As urban noise is a global concern and scope, students may face the need to make decisions related to environmental practices in their future lives, such as those concerning comfortable sound levels. Articulating the STS Approach with Environmental Education, we seek to combine the interdisciplinary content of Acoustics with an environmental awareness that goes beyond mere conservationist reductionism. In addition to the mandatory curricular knowledge, STS Education adopts a scientific and technological education based on a social construction that is culturally and socially contextualized.

Propositions of the STS approach for Teaching Natural Sciences and Guidelines of Brazil’s National Common Curriculum Base for Elementary Education

A Base Nacional Comum Curricular (BNCC) para o nível fundamental da educação básica foi publicada em 2017 e, desde então, apesar de constituir-se como documento normativo da educação básica nacional, é tema de análises e discussões sobre seu conteúdo e sua aplicabilidade. Este artigo tem por objetivo tecer uma análise junto a este documento procurando por aproximações e distanciamentos entre tais normatizações e as proposições da abordagem Ciência-Tecnologia-Sociedade, conforme os estudos de Santos e Mortimer (2002), Aikenhead (1994), Ziman (1980) entre outros. Para balizar este estudo, realizamos uma pesquisa qualitativa documental junto à BNCC, procurando pelos mencionados pontos de encontros e desencontros. Os pontos desvelados foram tratados pelo método de Análise Textual Discursiva (ATD), conforme Moraes e Galiazzi (2006). Para organizar os resultados, foram elencadas categorias a priori, conforme Cortez e Del Pino (2017), permitindo destacar coerências como o uso da problematização e dicotomias como a formação crítica do educando.

INTRODUCTION TO THE CONCEPT OF ELECTRICAL ENERGY WITH 5TH YEAR STUDENTS FROM A PUBLIC SCHOOL THROUGH THE STS APPROACH

O objetivo deste trabalho foi abordar o conceito de energia elétrica por meio do enfoque CTS com 28 estudantes do 5º ano de uma escola pública da cidade de Telêmaco Borba – PR, fazendo assim a inserção da Física nos anos iniciais, bem como trabalhando a consciência crítica dos estudantes. Para este trabalho utilizou-se como instrumento de coleta de dados registros em áudio e fotografia. A pesquisa tem caráter qualitativo e de pesquisa-ação. Buscou-se por meio da sequência trabalhada favorecer a dialogicidade dentro da sala de aula, bem como propiciando atividades com enfoque CTS para a produção de maior significado e contexto para os estudantes. A sequência foi trabalhada em 4 encontros (16 aulas). Os resultados mostram que a abordagem utilizada auxiliou para a aprendizagem dos estudantes, bem como despertou nos mesmos a reflexão acerca de questões ambientais. Houve interação e dialogicidade entre professora-aluno/aluno-aluno, sendo a professora o mediador no processo de ensino e aprendizagem. Pelos depoimentos dos estudantes acredita-se que passaram a se importar com questões como economia de água, de luz, preocupações com o meio ambiente. Propostas como esta deveriam estar mais presentes em aulas dos anos iniciais, pois assim estaríamos trabalhando com o gosto pela ciência desde cedo.

Smoothness as a quality of care: An STS approach to transnational healthcare mediation

Medical travel and transnational healthcare involve various difficulties such as the distance and disconnect between patients and healthcare providers, language barriers or logistical challenges of moving ill bodies across space. Medical travel facilitation steps in with some sort of brokerage service that contributes to overcoming or managing these difficulties and, as this paper suggests, acts to create a quality of ‘smoothness’. By unpacking three salient facilitation practices, namely connecting, communicating, and coordinating, this paper conceptualises the empirically derived category of ‘smoothness’. This as a disposition, outcome, and spatio-temporal manoeuvre of medical travel facilitation. Based on the way in which such practices of mediation act to create smoothness, namely in an attentive, persistent, and collective tinkering manner, this paper suggests that some practices of medical travel facilitation are productively thought not just about setting up the possibility of care transnationally, but that they are key forms of care in itself. Based on these findings, smoothness is considered to be a central but also contested quality of medical travel facilitation and brokerage in a broader sense, but as proposed here, also for care. This conclusion potentially has implications not just for the study of transnational healthcare and mediation activities, but also that of care and transnational mobilities more generally.

Epistemological approaches between the STS approach and professional and technological education

O presente artigo apresenta os resultados de uma pesquisa referente à Educação Profissional e Tecnológica no Brasil e à abordagem Ciência-Tecnologia-Sociedade (CTS), visando identificar pontos de aproximação epistemológica entre as referidas modalidade e abordagem de ensino. Para alcançar tal objetivo optou-se por uma pesquisa qualitativa bibliográfica junto aos trabalhos de Frigotto (1999), Cardoso (2008), Frigotto et al. (2005), Garcia (2000) entre outros. Após análise, encontramos diversos pontos de aproximação que foram separados em duas categorias emergentes, uma, tratando de conceitos e outra, desvelando aproximações quanto às orientações metodológicas e aos objetivos propostos.

Turning investments green in bond markets: Qualification, devices and morality

This paper explores the issuance and growth of transition and sustainability-linked bonds into the green market segment normally reserved for green bonds between 2018 and 2021. Using a performative economics and STS approach we examine how key terms within environmental political discourse – transition, green, sustainability – have been incorporated into the operation of investment markets, and given specific, if unstable and contested, technico-economic forms. Using event ethnography, industry literature and primary interviews, we examine how classification works as a market device, by exploring why the newer ‘transition bond’ was favoured by some investors but not others in comparison to green and sustainability bonds. We argue that the credibility of different green labelled products is being mediated by uneven references to scientific evidence, in the context of competing marketization strategies, which have world-making effects.

Creative Thinking Boost: Discovery Learning and STS Approach for Middle School

This research aimed to analyze the impact of Discovery Learning model implementation through a Science-Technology-Society (STS) approach on creative thinking skills among middle school students. A quantitative pre-experimental design with a one-group pretest-posttest method was utilized. The study was conducted on a sample of 14 students from Muhammadiyah 4 Porong Middle School, with the instrument being a test of creative thinking skills. Data were gathered through pretest and posttest scores, analyzed using N-Gain test. The result, an N-Gain score of 0.38, indicated a moderate effect of the Discovery Learning model via the STS approach on the students' creative thinking skills. The skills were divided into four indicators: fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration. Post-intervention, fluency exhibited the highest improvement, followed by flexibility and elaboration, while originality showed the least progress. Despite certain limitations in originality and detail-oriented thinking, the study still provided strong evidence for the efficacy of the combined Discovery Learning and STS approach in enhancing students' creative thinking abilities, endorsing its broader application in education settings to foster creativity.
 Highlights:
 
 
 
 
 Discovery Learning model coupled with the Science-Technology-Society (STS) approach moderately improves students' creative thinking skills.
 Among the four assessed creative thinking indicators, fluency and flexibility displayed significant improvement.
 Despite the less notable progress in originality, the combined model's overall positive impact endorses its broader application in education settings.
 
 
 
 
 Keywords: Discovery Learning, Science-Technology-Society Approach, Creative Thinking Skills, Middle School Education, N-Gain Score

Gestures and Inscriptions in Ceramics and Sound: A combined STS, Queer Marxist and Artistic Research approach to the study of Reproductive Politics

This exposition brings together Artistic Research, Science and Technology Studies and Queer Marxism to examine the gestural nature of reproductive politics. It argues for an expansive understanding of the gesture that extends well beyond the domain of the embodied gesture to include different registers and materialities of cultural and scientific inscription. Broadly, I explore reproductive politics not only as a question of reproductive health –of access and choice– but as the daily negotiation of the body’s value and legibility across communication, labour and political fields. By questioning -through artistic action- the inevitability of the economic and social conditions that devalue or invisibilise reproductive work, this article also elaborates on the gestural nature of artistic research as counter-institutional practice.

БАЙКАЛЬСКАЯ КОНТРОВЕРЗА И СОВЕТСКАЯ НАУЧНАЯ ЭКСПЕРТИЗА: ИСТОРИЯ ОДНОГО СЕЙСМОЛОГИЧЕСКОГО СПОРА (1962–1963 гг.)

The paper examines some beginning events of the Baikal discussion using the STS approach. The author addresses the disputes about seismicity of the Baikal Pulp and Paper Mill (PP M) and Selenga Paper Mill sites in 1962–1963 to identify the specifics of Soviet expertise and the role of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences as an expert. In February, 1962, the Siberian Branch approached the Council of Ministers of the USSR with the proposal to reject the construction of pulp and paper mills on Baikal because of the increased seismic hazard of the selected sites. The scientists of the Siberian Branch of the Academy of Sciences defined the latter as 10 points, after which the State Construction Committee banned further construction of the Baikal PP M until this circumstance was clarified. Finally, the government commission and additional construction experts estimated the sites of both plants at 9 points. The attempt of the Siberian Branch to challenge this conclusion was not successful. The author reconstructs the events of this counter-version and concludes that in the sphere of expertise the political moment of the Baikal discussion manifested itself not in the positions of the parties and not even in their arguments, but in the ability of government institutions to determine when the discussion was possible and when it should have stopped.

Situações-problema mediadoras de articulações CTS no Ensino de Ciências

In the present work, we focus on evaluating the potential use of problem situations as a didactic and pedagogical strategy to the insertion of the STS approach in the context of the final years of elementary school. It is an action research, developed during a continuous formation of science teachers, in the format of a study collective. Together with the teachers, we developed four projects with students from sixth to ninth grade, totaling over 1500 students. We resorted to discursive textual analysis for the apprehension of pertinent aspects to the STS approach, which allowed us to realize that the proposal proved to be subject to discussions and articulations about science, technology and/or society; favored the process of appropriation of scientific knowledge, ie, it provided scientific literacy and led to awareness and/or decision making, that is, provided the exercise of citizenship.

Developing the STS electric and electric power unit for design based STEM activities

Recently, there is increasingly providing STEM learning activities in school setting. This paper aimed to clarify the developing STS electric and electric power unit for design based STEM activities. STEM education learning activities need to be developed through design based learning activities. The STS electric and electric power unit, therefore, was developed regarding on STS approach and structuring students’ ideas of designing for problem solving by providing the steps of engineering process design. The paper, then, clarify the details of STS electric and electric power unit. The unit will bring the social issues to the classroom in order to engage students’ identify the problem for solving. Then, the unit will suggest the engineering process design to students in order to scaffold students to design for developing the prototypes for solutions. This paper may have implication for providing design based STEM activities.

Influencers as socio-technical actors: mapping the paths of influence and the traces of the digital influencers’ system in Italy

In recent years, digital influencers or digital opinion leaders have emerged as a global phenomenon, one providing a rich field of investigation for several disciplines from sociology to marketing. The goal of the paper is to study this phenomenon by adopting an ecological approach, not focusing only on a single dimension but observing the influencer system as an environment with its own rules and subjects, examining the other components of the system and tracing the relationships between them. The original contribution of this paper is to conceptualize influencers as socio-technical actors, i.e. as social subjects that operate within technological platforms, and to adopt an interdisciplinary approach, starting from sociological and marketing studies on the influencer phenomenon and then moving on to STS studies that have focused on the social shaping of technology to shed light on how the influencers are transforming the (social) media system in which they are inserted and then the chain of communication industry. The argument will therefore start by reviewing the theories that address this phenomenon and by sketching a genealogy, tracing its roots in the cultural and social context of the participatory web and web 2.0. It will move, then, to investigate the dynamics of shaping social media platforms, reviewing the studies that have investigated them, from the Social Shaping of Technology approach to platform studies. The paper will apply the analysis to the Italian context, unfolding the dynamics of influence with the support of the case study of ClioMakeUp (the leading beauty creator in Italy), examples, and grey literature from the Italian context. In the final part, the paper will map the traces of the influencer system in Italy and the communication chain, focusing on the processes of mutual shaping between brands, communication agencies, influencer enterprises, regulatory bodies, media, and of course platforms. The STS approach proved to be useful in disentangling the several actors of the system, but as platforms evolved the opportunities for mutual shaping have gradually diminished as the balance of power seems to be tending in favor of the platforms. More research is needed to further understand the concepts of closure, script, and relevant social groups within social media platforms.

Learning in Crisis: Training students to monitor and address irresponsible knowledge construction by U.S. federal agencies under Trump.

Immediately after President Trump's inauguration, U.S. federal science agencies began deleting information about climate change from their websites, triggering alarm among scientists, environmental activists, and journalists about the administration's attempt to suppress information about climate change and promulgate climate denialism. The Environmental Data & Governance Initiative (EDGI) was founded in late 2016 to build a multidisciplinary collaboration of scholars and volunteers who could monitor the Trump administration's dismantling of environmental regulations and science deemed harmful to its industrial and ideological interests. One of EDGI's main initiatives has been training activists and volunteers to monitor federal agency websites to identify how the climate-denialist ideology is affecting public debate and science policy. In this paper, we explain how EDGI's web-monitoring protocols are being incorporated into college curricula. Students are trained how to use the open-source online platforms that EDGI has created, but are also trained in how to analyze changes, determine whether they are significant, and contextualize them for a public audience. In this way, EDGI's work grows out of STS work on "critical making" and "making and doing." We propose that web-monitoring exemplifies an STS approach to responsive and responsible knowledge production that demands a more transparent and trustworthy relationship between the state and the public. EDGI's work shows how STS scholars can establish new modes of engagement with the state, and create spaces where the public can not only define and demand responsible knowledge practices, but also participate in the process of creating STS inspired forms of careful, collective and public knowledge construction.

Examine Students’ Perception on Their Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Ability through Journal Writing for Learning about Genetics and DNA Technology

This study examined grade 12 students’ perception on their critical thinking and problem-solving ability when they participated in the STS genetics and DNA technology unit. The participants were 43 grade 12 students in Maung, Khon Kaen, Thailand. The STS genetics and DNA technology unit were provided learning activities through STS approach in framework of Yuenyong (2006) and has been taught by the first author for 3 weeks. Methodology regarded interpretive paradigm. Students’ perception on their critical thinking and problem-solving ability were interpreted through their reflection as journal writing for their learning about genetics and DNA technology. Students’ journal writing was collected after each class of the STS genetics and DNA technology unit was done. The findings revealed that students perceived on their critical thinking and problem-solving ability when they wrote their journals to reflect what they learned. These reflections provided 4 elements of critical thinking and problem-solving ability. These included reason effectively, used systems thinking, make judgment and decisions, and solve problem. These finding would be a good practices for teaching biology through STS approach to who may take further applications for science teaching and learning.

STEM Education Teaching approach: Inquiry from the Context Based

This study aimed to develop theoretical framework for STEM teaching strategies in school setting. The paper clarified what the worldwide leaders and educators’ beliefs, focuses, and actions of STEM education; what the conceptions of STEM education should be provided for teachers; Suggested STEM education teaching in aspect of practicing knowledge in real world through STS approach, concept of technology and engineering reserved for STEM education; the implementation of Yuenyong (2006)’ s STS approach for enhancing students’ applying scientific and other knowledge for designing the solutions in real-world problems. Based on these literatures, this paper will propose the practical idea of STEM education teaching approach which integration key concepts among problem based, project based, inquiry, design, and a real world problem solving as STS. The paper, therefore, propose the theoretical framework of STEM education teaching approach as inquiry from the context based. The teaching approach consists of 7 stages. These include (1) Identification of social issues, (2) Identification of potential solution, (3) Need for knowledge, (4) Decision-making, (5) Development of prototype or product, (6) Test and evaluate the Solution, and (7) Socialization and completion decision stage. The paper discussed more details of each stage.

Science, Technology, and Society Approaches to Fieldwork in Geography

Geographers who take a science, technology, and society (STS) approach to research recognize that the doing of science happens within particular social and historical contexts. Additionally, the production and representation of scientific knowledge occurs via networks of human and nonhuman actors. This article considers how coconstructivist STS emphasizes the processes and practices whereby knowledge and context produce each other simultaneously. A particular focus of this article is to show how taking an STS approach alters both the construction of research questions and the doing of fieldwork, especially for those geographers less familiar with STS. Although not intended to be an in-depth introduction to STS, this article explores the central tenets of coconstructivist STS, including its ontological foundations, processes of critical knowledge production, and methods, to demonstrate the applicability of this approach to geographic inquiry. Specific fieldwork examples from case studies on nonlethal weaponry in Bangkok, Thailand, and on long-term political effects of the Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine illustrate how a coconstructivist STS approach can be meaningful to geographic research and fieldwork. Key Words: Chernobyl disaster, fieldwork methods, knowledge production, nonlethal weapons, STS.

Aproximações entre resolução de problemas e modelagem matemática com o enfoque CTS

Este estudo objetiva verificar a aproximação da Educação Matemática Crítica com a abordagem Ciência, Tecnologia e Sociedade (CTS). Envolve uma pesquisa qualitativa, do tipo intervenção pedagógica, realizada em um colégio da rede privada da cidade de Curitiba, com alunos do 1º ano do Ensino Médio, utilizando Resolução de Problemas e Modelagem Matemática. As aulas contemplaram atividades sobre progressão aritmética, estatística, porcentagem e funções exponenciais, trabalhadas com abordagens de resolução de problemas, no caso do primeiro conteúdo, e modelagem matemática, para os demais. Além dos conteúdos matemáticos, a prática abordou temáticas relativas à presença de adolescentes em academias, uso de celular e seu impacto no cotidiano do ser humano e efeitos da maconha no organismo. Para a análise das aproximações entre as metodologias utilizadas e o enfoque CTS, buscou-se na literatura as principais características de tal enfoque, bem como etapas propostas para seu desenvolvimento. A análise realizada mostrou que a Resolução de Problemas apresentou uma sequência de reflexões sobre as temáticas presentes nas situações-problemas semelhante às sequências indicadas para uma abordagem CTS. O projeto realizado na Modelagem Matemática demonstrou constante presença de interdisciplinaridade e contextualização, sendo esses os quesitos necessários para o ensino na perspectiva CTS. Foi possível estabelecer algumas relações para um ensino com enfoque CTS tanto na Resolução de Problemas como na Modelagem Matemática. Percebeu-se que a mediação do professor é o que possibilita os direcionamentos apropriados para que os conteúdos matemáticos possam trazer embasamento científico e tecnológico para atuação dos alunos na sociedade.

Estudo da produção científica sobre o enfoque CTS em revistas brasileiras especializadas

O estudo teve como objetivos principais: mapear, classificar e analisar descritivamente produções científicas acerca do enfoque Ciência, Tecnologia e Sociedade – CTS, publicadas entre 2011 e 2015 em revistas brasileiras. Foram selecionadas 4 revistas especializadas nas áreas de Ensino e Educação, classificadas com Qualis A1 e A2. Por meio da leitura de títulos e resumos dos 803 artigos publicados nesse período, foram escolhidas 30 publicações para serem analisadas. As principais informações bibliométricas desses textos foram sistematizadas em formato de tabela e os documentos completos dispostos em uma unidade hermenêutica do software ATLAS.ti para posterior análise. A partir de critérios bibliométricos e da leitura completa dos textos foi possível identificar: 1) interesse dos pesquisadores por trabalhar no campo da Educação em Ciências e pela formação de professores; 2) interesse pela abordagem de questões sociocientíficas; 3) tendência à realização de intervenções didáticas e estudos de caso; 4) interesse por conhecer percepções da comunidade acadêmica acerca de ciência e de tecnologia, assim como pelas dificuldades para a implementação de atividades CTS. Concluiu-se que nos últimos anos tem sido consolidado um conjunto de referências brasileiras que discutem o tema, gerando, consequentemente, uma forma particular de pensar o enfoque CTS. No entanto, percebeu-se a necessidade de aproximar essa produção com estudos realizados nos países vizinhos para, dessa forma, contribuir para a construção de uma perspectiva latino-americana de progresso educativo, social e tecnocientífico.

Sociotechnical perspectives on digitalisation and Industry 4.0

The sociotechnical systems approach and theory (STS) helps to deal with today's rapid digital transformations in designing best suitable work, organisations and jobs. Not surprisingly, related approaches based on STS assumptions, such as modern sociotechnical thinking (MST) and workplace innovation (WPI) theory, are rapidly developing in Europe. Yet, research and (theoretical) analyses that place STS in today's digital industry challenges and WPI are sparse. The basics of sociotechnical concepts and new research, needs and perspectives for further development of STS in today's context need to be explored. Therefore, against the background of empirical experiences in logistics and process industry and in context of Industry 4.0, this article discusses firstly the model of classical STS approach and the skill orientated work design. Secondly, MST and its derived concept of WPI is positioned. Furthermore, a complementary 'practice theory' perspective is introduced, illustrated by an example design project. Finally, some future recommendations for research are made.

Sociotechnical perspectives on digitalisation and Industry 4.0

The sociotechnical systems approach and theory (STS) helps to deal with todays rapid digital transformations in designing best suitable labour, organisations and jobs. Not surprisingly, related approaches based on STS assumptions, such as Modern Sociotechnical Thinking (MST) and Workplace Innovation (WPI) theory, are rapidly developing in Europe. Yet, research and (theoretical) analyses that place STS in todays digital industry challenges and WPI are sparse. The basics of sociotechnical concepts and new research, needs and perspectives for further development of STS in todays context need to be explored. Therefore, against the background of empirical experiences in logistics and process industry and in context of Industry 4.0, this article discusses firstly the model of classical STS approach and the skill orientated work design. Secondly, MST and its derived concept of WPI is positioned. Furthermore, a complementary practice theory perspective is introduced, illustrated by an example design project. Finally, some future recommendations for research are made.