Investigation of Students’ Alternative Conceptions of Terms and Processes of Gene Technology

Table 4

Coupling of students’ conceptions to the different terms and processes of gene technology.

Conceptions about …	Frequency of coupled student conceptions (percentage)
	None^a	Two	Three	Four	Five
Gene^b	32.6	38.9	11.8	3.5	—
Genetic engineering^c	12.5	43.1	18.1	2.8	1.4
Clone^d	6.3	29.9	41.0	18.8	0.7
Enzyme^e	18.8	18.8	6.9	2.8	—
Inheritance of traits^f	34.7	52.1	3.5	—	—
Transfer of genes^g	28.5	29.2	12.5	—	—
Change of genotype^h	32.6	27.8	13.2	2.8	0.7

aProportion of students that described only one conception; ^bto ^hfrequency of students describing no conceptions: ^b13.2%; ^c22.2%; ^d3.5%; ^e52.8%; ^f9.7%; ^g29.9%; ^h22.9%.