Higher Education in Environmental Sciences: The Effects of Incorporating Expert Information in Group Discussions of a Transdisciplinary Case Study

Abstract

This article analyzes the impact of expert information on learning effects of students who participated in a transdisciplinary case study as part of a curriculum of Higher Education in Environmental Sciences. 80 master program students of Environmental Natural Sciences at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich in their fourth year were involved in a case study on ecological regional planning. The study included a field experiment, which examined how different formats of group discussions influence the students' judgments on impact relations (IRs) between variables relevant to the case. The formats were (a) conventional group discussions, versus (b) group discussions including the preliminary disclosure of expert judgments. The analysis showed that in the experimental and the control groups, the students' individual judgments approached the expert judgments in the course of the discussions. This tendency was significantly stronger in the groups where the expert estimates were disclosed. However, there were only minor differences between the two conditions with respect to the students' confidence in their judgments. A longitudinal analysis comparing the students' judgments at the beginning vs. at the end of the case study showed that the judgments approached the expert judgments during the case study. This was true for IRs where expert information was given as part of the experiment, as well as for IRs where no expert information was given. The discussion addresses possible didactical conclusions and perspectives for further research.