Abstract

VIVAS, Jorge Ricardo; COMESANA, Ana  and  VIVAS, Leticia Yanina. Semantic network assesment of academic concepts in undergraduate students. PsicoUSF [online]. 2007, vol.12, n.1, pp. 111-119. ISSN 1413-8271.

The Extended Theory of the Propagation of the Activation is one of the more accepted models to represent the information stored in the long term memory. In this model isolated concepts do not have meaning but they acquire it by their relation with the others. The aim of this paper is to communicate the results of an experience in which it was applied a method to estimate the semantic distances (Distsem) between nine concepts of the subject cognitive psychology in three instances, individual initial, group and individual final. The participants were 225 students from third year of the career of psychology (National University of Mar del Plata) that were taking the course of cognitive psychology. Subjects were asked to estimate the proximity between random pairs of concepts and then it was applied a set of Social Network Analyses routines. The results show that the student´s semantic networks changed positively in the second individual instance thank to group interaction. The conclusions suggest an association between initial knowledge and the influence exerted in the group product and allow describing the evolution of the networks

Keywords : Semantic networks; Group influence; Assessment method.

        · abstract in Spanish     · text in Spanish     · Spanish ( pdf )