Evolution is the central organizing theory of biology. Without evolutionary theory, biology becomes a somewhat tangential assemblage of facts about living organisms, which is precisely how it is viewed by many students. Many teachers teach evolution in a limited capacity or avoid it entirely due to fear of opposition, lack of confidence in their own understanding, or lack of acceptance of the theory themselves. When evolution is not taught, or is not accepted, it cannot be utilized to make sense of the field, and is quickly forgotten by students. While some studies have shown a correlation between instruction about evolution and acceptance of evolution, many have not. Understanding which instructional factors, both pedagogical and conceptual, contribute to increases in evolution acceptance are paramount if we are going to make biology education more cohesive and applicable beyond the context of the course itself. To better understand what these factors may be, I utilized curriculum that I developed previously to teach introductory biology to non-biology majors that incorporated evolution as the organizing structure and appeared to produce considerable increases in acceptance of evolution based on the lack of hostility and pushback from the students in the course. I verified that the curriculum as taught produced increases in acceptance of evolution using the Measure of Acceptance of the Theory of Evolution (MATE) instrument as a measure of acceptance, and by asking students on the final exam what their position had been before instruction and if it had changed as a result of the course. Both measures revealed a considerable increase in evolution acceptance. Using a full factorial experimental design, tested three major pedagogical approaches that have all been hypothesized to contribute to increasing evolution acceptance: Constructivist-inspired vs Behaviorist-inspired, active vs less active instruction, and reflexive journaling vs not journaling. While all possible combinations of treatments showed statistically significant increases in evolution acceptance, there was no statistically significant difference between any of the treatments or combinations of treatments. Also, using Thematic Analysis, we coded and analyzed the responses that students provided as to the concepts from class that played a role in their having changed or not changed their positions on evolution as reported on the final exams, and in their reflexive journals which provided a valuable window into the concepts that we might emphasize or choose to remove or deemphasize in the future to maximize the probability that student acceptance of evolution will increase following instruction.

Students frequently hold an incorrect view of evolution. There are several potential barriers that prevent students from engaging evolutionary theory including lack of knowledge, limited scientific reasoning ability, and religiosity. Our research provides tools for overcoming barriers related to religiosity and diagnoses the barriers preventing students from fully engaging in learning the theory of evolution. This was a two-part study. The first part of our study addressed two hypothesized barriers to learning evolutionary theory among members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS or Mormon): (1) religious views stemming from incorrect understanding of the Church's neutral stance on evolution and (2) misunderstanding the theory of evolution. We measured the relationship between acceptance of evolution and knowledge of evolution, religiosity, and understanding of religious doctrine on evolution. Additionally, we measured the effect of including a discussion on religious doctrine in the classroom. Students in all sections, except for a control section, were taught a unit on evolution that included a discussion on the neutral LDS doctrine on evolution. Students enrolled in introductory biology for non-majors took pre, post, and longitudinal surveys on topics in evolution. We found significant relationships between knowledge, understanding of religious doctrine, and religiosity with acceptance of evolution. Additionally, an in-class discussion of he LDS doctrine on evolution helped students be more accepting of evolution. In the second part of our study, we studied a broader population to analyze differences in acceptance of evolution based on religious affiliation and religiosity. Our study focused on the interaction of five variables and their implication for evolution education: (1) religious commitment (2) religious views (3) knowledge of evolution (4) scientific reasoning ability and (5) acceptance of evolution. We measured each of these among equal samples of Southern Baptists, Catholics, Jews, and LDS populations and analyzed them with traditional statistics and structural equation modeling. Our findings showed that religious affiliation, religiosity and creationist views effected evolution acceptance, but not knowledge or scientific reasoning. These data provide compelling evidence that as students gain an accurate understanding of their religious doctrines and knowledge of evolution, they are more willing to accept the basic concepts of evolution. They also show diagnostic results that help educators better understand students' background and views. When educators better understand views that students hold, they are better able to design instruction for optimal learning.