For over thirty years, my passion has been studying how people learn. I began my Ph.D. studies in 1988 at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa, under the direction of Dr. Fred Bail (see my blog post in his honor).

My interests first brought me to look at how people organize knowledge and what happens when scientific consensus about differs from what the students think. In those days, this was called the study of student misconceptions.

My work has been heavily influenced by the work of Dr. Micki Chi, especially her insight into how the nature of a concept can impact our understanding. My latest article about this line of work can be found here and was led by my former post-doc, Dazhi Yang, now a professor at Boise State.

Most recently, I have become fascinated by the role our affiliations with various social groups plays in what knowledge we will accept as “true.” I call this phenomenon socially-embedded conceptual change, and that phrase inspired the current name of this blog. I have a piece that is due to be published in summer 2022 about my thoughts about this. So watch this space!