Abstracts - Earli

is generally defined as the theory about the nature of knowledge and the process of knowing.Investigations of young children are scarce in this field and little is known about the early onset ofepistemological development. We look closely at very young children and how their cognitiveability and interactions with peers may reveal information regarding epistemological development.The aim of this study is two-fold: (1) to investigate virtually undocumented research regarding 3-to 4-year-olds’ demonstration of personal epistemology, and (2) to assess their affect, language,and relationships utilizing peer focus groups. This study has been previously piloted to refine theparticipant selection and epistemological questioning protocol. Focus groups are rarely utilizedwith children; however they provide a platform for the investigators to capture the essence of thechildren’s knowledge in their own words. The study has six child-participants; they are dividedinto two groups of three and are involved in a total of six focus groups each over a six weekperiod. Preliminary results of data analysis suggest that focus groups provide a unique andabundant source of epistemological insights. This study stands to promote theoretical andeducational advancements in the field in general and with the research of young childrenspecifically.Personal epistemologies, work and learningStephen Billett, Griffith University, AustraliaThis paper elaborates concepts of epistemologies beliefs and how they are exercised in anddeveloped through individuals’ engagement with paid work. It proposes that elaborating personalepistemologies is central to understanding how individuals engage in activities such as paid work,how they learn through those experiences and go onto remake their work activities. So their role inboth individual and cultural change is elaborated. These epistemologies are seen here asindividuals’ ways of knowing and acting that arise from their capacities, earlier experiences andnegotiations with the social and brute world. Importantly, they do much to shape how individualsconstrue and construct what they experience. In this way, they can be seen the exercising ofindividuals’ subjectivities. Yet, through that exercise these epistemologies are also refined,reinforced and transformed when engaging in activities, such as paid work. The paper draws oninvestigations of learning through work in a range of occupations in order to discuss the characterand role of personal epistemologies at work. It concludes by suggesting a central role for theseepistemologies in situations where social affordances (e.g. support) are relatively weak. Forinstance, older workers and those working in socially or physically isolated circumstances mayneed to rely upon their personal epistemologies.Do students of natural sciences and students of social sciences differ in their cognitive style?Christian Harteis, University of Regensburg, GermanyEpistemic beliefs reproduce subjective assumptions about the nature of knowledge. One parameterof epistemic beliefs is the preferred way of acquainting oneself with new insights. An instrumentto assess such a basic way of interpreting the world is the Cognitive Style Index (Allinson &Hayes, 1996), which indicates whether subjects prefer an intuitive-heuristic or a rational-analyticway of thinking. Evidence supports the assumption that people from different professionaldomains differ in their CSI scores. This contribution includes an empirical study conducted with71 teacher students of different domains (natural and social sciences) from two different Germanuniversities. Students of natural sciences are supposed to focus on rational-analytical thoughtswhereas students of social sciences also include and train philosophical and heuristic approaches.Additionally, people in the two investigated regions within Germany frequently are supposed todiffer in individual traits. Contra-intuitively, no significant differences between could be observed.– 63 –