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Meaningful learning for conceptual change in science education should aim to help students change their existing misconceptions to develop an accurate understanding of scientific concepts. Although collaborative argumentation is assumed to support such processes, its value for conceptual change is unclear. Moreover, the roles of argumentative dialogue should be considered in studies on collaborative argumentation. In the present study, using a controlled experiment, we examined the value of collaborative argumentation for conceptual change in science education while fully considering the roles of argumentative dialogue. Twenty-three postgraduate students were each allocated to one of two conditions (individual argumentation [control group] and collaborative argumentation [experimental group]) and participated in two argumentation activities. The results revealed that collaborative argumentation had a delayed but long-lasting effect on conceptual change in science education (i.e., conceptual change induced by collaborative argumentation did not immediately indicate a significant improvement at the moments of argumentation but showed a significant improvement during the delay period). Collaborative argumentation provided opportunities for change in cognitive, ontological, intentional, and other aspects of learning. Dialogue protocol analysis revealed that long-lasting conceptual change was associated with a U-shaped pattern of argumentative dialogue (i.e., two high and one low: both deliberative argumentation and co-consensual construction frequently occurred, while disputative argumentation rarely occurred) in collaborative argumentation. A third argumentation activity was then conducted to confirm this unexpected finding. The results confirmed an association between long-lasting conceptual change and a U-shaped pattern of argumentative dialogue in collaborative argumentation. The current study sheds light on the value of collaborative argumentation for long-lasting conceptual change, deepening our understanding of whether conceptual gains from argumentation activities were contingent on a particular type of verbal dialogue powered by collaborative argumentation. Implications for science education were discussed.

In the present study, using complex network analysis, we conducted a one-year including two semesters to investigate the effect of social network intervention on college students' social perception biases. One hundred and seventy college students participated in this study. Social network intervention was implemented in the second semester. Through changing individuals' social neighbors and being augmented with four collaborative activities, modeling analysis showed students' social perception biases were contingent on the level of homophily of their personal networks. Results also showed students' social perception biases were significantly reduced after old social relationships being broken up and new social relationships being built. Furthermore, in the individual interviews, students reported heterogeneous re-grouping ensued by social network intervention offered them with opportunities of "Diversity of thinking", "Creation of argumentative climates" and "Open-mindedness and inclusiveness change".

Spatial ability is an influential factor for academic performance in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education. However, the roles of spatial strategies are unclear. Therefore, coupling with virtual Starmaze developed by fields of cognitive neuroscience, this study aimed to explore spatial strategy among STEM students and its role in academic performance. A virtual Starmaze was constructed to test how students complete a navigation test. A total of 172 college students majoring in STEM participated in this study. Modeling analysis showed students tend to use allocentric strategy when the difficulty of spatial tasks increased. Results further showed students with high STEM academic performance tended to use allocentric strategy while ones with low STEM academic performance tended to use egocentric strategy. Specifically, academic performances in science and mathematics learning were associated with the allocentric strategy, while academic performances in technology and engineering learning were associated with proficiency and hands-on ability.

Scientific argumentation as a scientific practice has become an important issue in scientific concept learning. We systematically searched five databases to assess the potential of scientific argumentation to promote multidimensional conceptual change in science education. The systematic literature search and coding of studies were carried out by two independent reviewers. Our search uncovered 12 experimental studies that investigated 12 different types of scientific argumentation-based instructions (scientific argumentation-based instructions in this study referred to lesson activities). With the multidimensional framework of conceptual change developed by McLure, F., Won, M., & Treagust, D. F. ((2020), we performed a narrative synthesis assessing how each type of scientific argumentation-based instruction affected conceptual change through cognitive, ontological and intentional dimensions of learning. Our narrative synthesis suggests scientific argumentation might affect conceptual change through enhancing those dimensions of learning to varying degrees. Moreover, certain added scaffoldings might be particularly useful for enhancing a certain dimension of learning. Finally, the meta-analysis (random effect model) showed that overall, scientific argumentation-based instructions had a large positive influence on conceptual change (Hedge's "g" = 10.49 [7.27, 13.71], I2 = 47%). Overall results indicated that scientific argumentation had the potential to improve conceptual change through offering opportunities for cognitive, ontological and intentional dimensions of learning.