Artigo Revisado por pares

Children's perceptions of nuclear power stations as revealed through their drawings

1987; Elsevier BV; Volume: 7; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/s0272-4944(87)80029-4

ISSN

1522-9610

Autores

Jennifer Brown, Joyce Henderson, Martin Armstrong,

Tópico(s)

Science Education and Perceptions

Resumo

Children's own drawings were used to reveal their changing perceptions of nuclear power stations over time. In all, 213 different children from three schools in the South East of England completed drawings in May 1983, December 1985, and in May and October 1986. A content analysis showed that the 1986 post-Chernobyl drawings were more likely to contain chimneys, smoke, pipes, and cooling towers. They were less likely to show bombs or rockets, features of earlier drawings. The collective pattern of features in the drawings was elaborated through a multidimensional scaling technique, the Guttman—Lingoes Smallest Space Analysis (SSA—I). A rationale is given for the use of this methodology whilst reference is made to a number of theoretical ideas for an understanding of the social processes involved.

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