| Summary: | 博士 === 國立高雄師範大學 === 教育學系 === 90 === Based on life concept development theories, conceptual classification theories, and ad hoc conceptual classification theories, this research intended to probe the life concept development of the elementary and junior high school students in both Kaohsiung city and kaohsiung county in hopes of presenting the research results for the reference of concept teaching and life education efforts. To attain this goal, the author analyzed related theories and researches, proposed both longitudinal and cross-sectional research designs, and made up life concept questionnaires. She chose 1364 grade one, three, five and seven students in Kaohsiung city and Kaohsiung county as purposive samples for the longitudinal study and administered the tests to them three times in one school year (from 2001 to 2002). In the cross-sectional study, she used urbanization and administration district as benchmarks and chose 2989 grade one, three, five and seven students from the same places as random samples. The data gathered were analyzed, compared and discussed by means of hierarchical linear model, one-way and multiple-way ANOVA, test, test, t-test and quality quasi-statistical induction. More than 30 findings were summarized as follows. With respect to the nature of life concepts, (1) life concept involves an ambiguous quality of natural concept. (2) The category an object belongs to and the essence of an object can affect children’s judgment of its life and choices of reasons. (3) The five ad hoc concepts─desires in life, growth of life, challenges in life, values of life, and choices in life─all have clear hierarchical structures. In terms of life concept development, (1) the subjects performed better in life concept judgment than in two-category life concept classification and performed the worst in three-category life concept classification. (2) In classifying individual items, the subjects perform better on “member exhaustion” than on “category exclusion,” and better on “category exclusion” than on “correct response.” (3) There are different critical stages in the subjects’ classification styles. Subjects at the stage between grades one and three use “move/not move,” subjects at the stage between grades three and five use “have/not have life,” and subjects at the stage between grades five and seven use “living/non-living things.” The critical stage at which subjects apply “three categories, completely exclusive” and improve the “2 plus 1”errorneous classification is between grades three and five.Factors that affect the development of life concept are as follows: (1) Grade level, gender, language performance and socioeconomic status can influence the students’ life concept judgment. (2) Grade level, gender, socioeconomic status and family structure can affect the students’ life concept classification. (3) Grade level, gender, socioeconomic status, urbanization degree, city/county difference and number of siblings can affect the students’ ad hoc life concept.As far as the confirmations of life concept development theories are concerned, Piaget’s animism and Carey’s view of theory-like conceptual change were confirmed.As to the tools for the test of life concept development, (1) the development of the measurement of life concept development has theoretical basis. (2) The making of the test of life concept development was conducted in a meticulous way. (3) The test of life concept development has good credibility and validity. (4) The test of life concept development can still be improved. According to the above conclusions, the author constructed the cross-sectional relations between life concept judgment, life concept classification and ad hoc life concept. Also, longitudinal growth models were constructed. Then she gave suggestions in terms of life education practice, issue education policies, life concept theories and further studies.
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