THE ROLE OF COGNITIVE FACTORS IN CHEMISTRY ACHIEVEMENT.

The article presents a study on the role of cognitive factors in the achievement in chemistry. The objective of the study was to evaluate the several cognitive factors such as: formal reasoning ability, prior knowledge, field dependence or independence and memory capacity. The evaluation was done through a test based on ones stored knowledge, laboratory application and chemical calculations. High school 11th grade students were considered as the sample in the study. The study showed that prior knowledge of the subject and formal reasoning were among the cognitive factors necessary in chemistry achievement.