PROGRESSIVE PROBLEMSHIFTS BETWEEN DIFFERENT RESEARCH PROGRAMS IN SCIENCE-EDUCATION - A LAKATOSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Given the importance of epistemology and philosophy of science, the La katos (1970) methodology is particularly suited to evaluate competing research programs in science education. This article has two objective s: (a) to evaluate critically the interpretations of Gilbert and Swift (1985) and Rowell and Dawson (1989), and (b) to postulate a progressi ve problemshift between Piaget's epistemic subject and Pascual-Leone's metasubject. Regarding the Gilbert and Swift interpretation, it is co ncluded that the alternative conceptions movement at its present stage of development cannot explain the previous success of its rival (Piag etian school) nor supersede it by a further display of heuristic power as required by Lakatos. If we accept the Rowell and Dawson thesis it would amount to the postulation of Piagetian and integrated (Piagetian and schema) theories as rival research programs. It appears that the Rowell and Dawson approach would enrich Piagetian theory with descript ive content rather than explanatory constructs, and thus would not lea d to a progressive problemshift. It is concluded that Pascual-Leone's theory extends Piaget's negative heuristic by introducing antecedent v ariables, and at the same time enriches the positive heuristic by intr oducing metasubjective task analysis, which leads to a progressive pro blemshift.