Conceptual Metaphor and the Study of Conceptual Change: Research synthesis and future directions

Abstract

Many of the goals of research on conceptual metaphor in science education overlap with the goals of research on conceptual change. The relevance of a conceptual metaphor perspective to the study of conceptual change has already been discussed. However, a substantial body of literature on conceptual metaphor in science education has now emerged. This work has not yet been synthesized or related explicitly to the goals of conceptual change research. This paper first presents a broad sketch of the study of conceptual change, characterizing the goals of this body of work, its contributions to date, and identifying open questions. Next, the literature on conceptual metaphor in science education is reviewed against this background. The review clarifies the natural theoretical connections between the conceptual metaphor perspective and the phenomenon of conceptual change. It then examines the contributions made by the literature on conceptual metaphor in science education to the goals of research on conceptual change—namely, characterizing student conceptions, identifying obstacles to learning, understanding the process of conceptual change, and designing productive pedagogical strategies that could achieve conceptual change. The paper concludes with a discussion of further avenues for research into conceptual change, suggested by adopting a conceptual metaphor perspective.

Key words:

• Science education
• Conceptual change
• Conceptual metaphor
• Research synthesis

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank David Brown and Rachel Scherr for very helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. The use of the descriptors “abstract” and “concrete” in this paper will be clarified later.

2. This latter point regarding metaphorical mappings implicit in everyday language is parallel to the point made in the science education literature about explicit instructional analogies. Even if a potentially productive source domain is provided by teachers, incorrect mappings performed by students can lead to misconceptions (see Glynn, 1989).

3. In principle, such a network is limitless! However, space limitations prohibit engaging with this issue here. See Carey (2009) for a proposal for how to identify that subset of beliefs that is key to the characterization of the content of a concept.