Investigating the Coherence of Middle School Students' Knowledge of Electrical Circuits

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Published: Apr 19, 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.12681/codiste.9905
Keywords:
Latent Class Analysis (LCA) electrical circuits fragmented knowledge mental models coherent knowledge
Ioanna Anastasiadou
Secondary Education
Dimitrios Stamovlasis
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
Abstract

This study investigates the coherency of knowledge held by middle school students regarding simple DC electrical circuits. To this end, a closed-type questionnaire comprising 10 questions with four possible answer choices was designed. Each answer corresponded to one of four mental models for electrical circuits found in the literature. The questionnaire was administered to 217 middle school students, and the Latent Class Analysis (LCA) method was employed to process the results. The analysis revealed coherency for only one of the four investigated mental models, the scientific model.


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