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ERIC Number: ED234315
Record Type: RIE
Publication Date: 1983-Mar
Pages: 16
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Students' Knowledge of "Things That Go Bump in the Night."
Palladino, Joseph J.; Carducci, Bernardo J.
Questionnaires designed to tap misconceptions of the content of psychology courses can serve as pedagogical devices useful for introducing students to topics and for evaluating student learning. The topic of sleep and dreams is of particular interest to students. To develop a useful introductory tool and to evaluate students' knowledge of sleep, dreams, and sleep disorders, a 39-item questionnaire in true/false format was designed. College students in introductory psychology courses (N=232) completed the questionnaire prior to coverage of those topics. In general, the results indicated that students were not poorly informed about the topics of sleep and dreams. Examples of students' inaccurate knowledge included beliefs that dreams only occur during REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, and that insomnia is caused by muscle tension. Students' major area of misinformation centered on some of the rarer sleep disorders, e.g., sleep apnea. However, students were knowledgeable concerning the difficulties associated with various sleep medications. The sleep and dreams questionnaire is appended. (WAS)
Publication Type: Reports - Research; Speeches/Meeting Papers; Tests/Questionnaires
Education Level: N/A
Audience: Practitioners; Teachers
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Note: Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Southeastern Psychological Association (29th, Atlanta, GA, March 23-26, 1983). Best copy available.