Problem-Solving Processes of High and Average Performers in Physics

This study examined cognitive processing differences reported between ex-perts and novices in physics, in order to compare corresponding processes in high and average school achievers. It explored the possibility that the cognitive processes of the high achiever more closely resemble those of ex-perts. Subjects were 12 boys and 9 girls from a grade eleven enriched physics course, divided into groups of high and average achievement. Two graduate students in physics and a high school physics teacher served as experts. All were asked to think aloud while solving five physics problems. The proto-cols were transcribed and segmented into clauses. Each clause was catego-rized as a metacognitive, planning, or content statement. Further analysis of the content statements indicated whether they were based on given or prior knowledge. Experts and high performers made more correct metastate-ments and more references to prior knowledge than the average performers, indicating similarities between high performance at the high school level and expertise in physics. The research literature on expertise and intellectual giftedness origi-nates in very different psychological traditions, namely, the cognitive and psychometric. Nevertheless, both portray important similarities between experts and novices on one hand, and gifted versus average-ability persons on the other