Students’ Understanding on Newton’s Third Law in Identifying the Reaction Force in Gravity Interactions

Shaona Zhou; Chunbin Zhang; Hua Xiao

doi:10.12973/eurasia.2015.1337a

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Shaona Zhou ¹, Chunbin Zhang ¹, Hua Xiao ¹ ^*

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¹ South China Normal University^* Corresponding Author

Abstract

Background:
In the past three decades, previous researches showed that students had various misconceptions of Newton’s Third Law. The present study focused on students’ difficulties in identifying the third-law force pair in gravity interaction situations.

Materials and methods:
An instrument involving contexts with gravity and non-gravity associated interactions was designed and conducted among students in junior secondary school, senior high school and university.

Results:
The finding revealed that students in all grades did statistically worse in gravity interaction contexts and had general difficulties in distinguishing interaction forces and balanced forces. However, students improved their reasoning on third-law force pair with the increase of grade level irrespective of contexts. Special difficulties for junior secondary school students in understanding gravity interaction were also addressed.

Conclusions:
It is important to emphasize that the educational contexts of gravity interactions should be paid more attention to.

Keywords

balanced forces
gravity interaction
interaction forces
misconceptions
newton’s third law

License

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Article Type: Research Article

EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed, Volume 11, Issue 3, 2015, 589-599

https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2015.1337a

Publication date: 02 Apr 2015

Article Views: 3518

Article Downloads: 2043

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How to cite this article

APA

Zhou, S., Zhang, C., & Xiao, H. (2015). Students’ Understanding on Newton’s Third Law in Identifying the Reaction Force in Gravity Interactions. Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, 11(3), 589-599. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2015.1337a

Vancouver

Zhou S, Zhang C, Xiao H. Students’ Understanding on Newton’s Third Law in Identifying the Reaction Force in Gravity Interactions. EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed. 2015;11(3):589-99. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2015.1337a

AMA

Zhou S, Zhang C, Xiao H. Students’ Understanding on Newton’s Third Law in Identifying the Reaction Force in Gravity Interactions. EURASIA J Math Sci Tech Ed. 2015;11(3), 589-599. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2015.1337a

Chicago

Zhou, Shaona, Chunbin Zhang, and Hua Xiao. "Students’ Understanding on Newton’s Third Law in Identifying the Reaction Force in Gravity Interactions". Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education 2015 11 no. 3 (2015): 589-599. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2015.1337a

Harvard

Zhou, S., Zhang, C., and Xiao, H. (2015). Students’ Understanding on Newton’s Third Law in Identifying the Reaction Force in Gravity Interactions. Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, 11(3), pp. 589-599. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2015.1337a

MLA

Zhou, Shaona et al. "Students’ Understanding on Newton’s Third Law in Identifying the Reaction Force in Gravity Interactions". Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, vol. 11, no. 3, 2015, pp. 589-599. https://doi.org/10.12973/eurasia.2015.1337a