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Category: Project

Description: Considerable in-depth studies have been carried out in the disciplines of psychology, neuroscience and education about executive functions (EFs) (Zelazo et al., 2016). Both teachers and parents have been increasingly becoming aware that these neurocognitive skills are fundamental in the students’ learning process across all school ages (Zelazo et al., 2016). There has been an extensive investigation about the role of EFs in fields such as language and mathematics, however there is limited research concerning the role of EFs in science learning, namely in physics (Chen & Whitehead, 2009; Thibault & Potvin, 2018; Vosniadou et al., 2018). Through this planned research a detailed investigation will be conducted to detect if and how EFs are linked with both the understanding of physics concepts and physics problem solving by utilizing both previously validated cognitive assessments and formal curriculum examinations. In addition, based on the extensive literature about the role of EFs in mathematical skills (Brookman-Byrne et al., 2018; Partanen et al., 2020; Ropovik, 2014), a detailed analysis concerning the investigation on the correlation among EFs, mathematical skills, the understanding of physics concepts, and physics problem solving is being presented for the first time, highlighting the uniqueness of this research. The selected age group for the current research is mid-adolescence students from 15 to 17 years of age, a period when students learn advanced concepts in both science and mathematics.