Guest Editors
Michael E. Loverude and Bradley S. Ambrose

The field of physics education research (PER) has achieved many successes. Systematic investigations have revealed innumerable insights into student thinking at the introductory level. Researchers working at the intersection of PER and cognitive science have established theoretical frameworks that have driven investigations of the thinking, behavior, and beliefs of students in introductory physics classes. For over 30 years the fruits of this work—including the development and assessment of reformed teaching strategies and practices—have been disseminated to the physics education community.

Attention has recently turned to other courses and student populations, with a growing subset of the field focusing on upper-division undergraduate courses and the physics majors in those courses. About 90% of the approximately 100 PER publications focusing on upper-division courses, content, and students have appeared since 2005. Seminal PER results at the introductory level have allowed researchers to predict with surprising reliability how basic conceptual and reasoning difficulties may manifest themselves later in advanced courses. Yet, researchers have also been uncovering new challenges and complexities in investigating student thinking and student behavior in upper-division courses.

The goal of this Focused Collection is to provide a compilation of current research articles that highlight the state of the field of physics education research as it relates to upper-division physics courses. The subjects of these articles might include (but are certainly not limited to):

• Content-specific studies of student learning and cognition. The content of upper-division courses is much more complex and challenging, and studies at this level must often wrestle with expert interpretations of physics content as well as student thinking.
• Role of mathematics. As students delve into more intricate models of physical systems, they are expected both to express physical principles in more sophisticated mathematical language and to extract deeper physical meaning from the mathematics. Researchers are beginning to document differences in the way mathematicians and physicists teach and understand the mathematical tools that upper level students are trying to master.
• Sociocultural studies. In addition to the obvious content and cognitive studies, researchers have begun to examine the sociocultural phenomena that characterize upper-division courses and the physics major. We particularly invite studies that investigate the experiences in these contexts of populations underrepresented in the broader physics community.
• Methodology. We invite discussions of the challenges in research and assessment specific to upper-division courses, including the difficulties in generalizing results from PER investigations performed in relatively low-enrollment courses and challenges in devel- oping and validating assessments for widespread use in course contexts and tasks more sophisticated than the introductory level.

For this special collection we invite papers that focus on physics education research conducted in the context of physics courses beyond the introductory level as well as research on issues that cut across specific courses and address the population of physics majors and minors. We invite empirical, theoretical, and review manuscripts. The focus is not intended to be on curricular materials or instructional strategies, but rather on original research. However, we recognize that many projects for this population are joint curriculum development and research projects in which the evaluation of curricular effectiveness is an integral part of the research. Papers might include summary articles of mature projects that have previously been described in the literature as well as descriptions of newer, more groundbreaking studies.

Submission Process

Interested authors should submit 1–2 page proposals (250–500 words) for full papers by March 31, 2014, to the guest editors, Michael E. Loverude (mloverude@fullerton.edu) and Bradley S. Ambrose (ambroseb@gvsu.edu). Proposals for manuscripts of empirical studies, review manuscripts, and theoretical manuscripts are welcome; each proposal must clearly indicate the type of manuscript that is envisioned. Proposals for manuscripts of empirical studies must describe a theoretical basis of the work, the research question(s), and research methods including data analysis. Proposals for review manuscripts should include the motivation for the review topic, the research methodology, and a sampling of references that will be used in the article. Proposals for theoretical manuscripts should offer critiques of—and if appropriate, address weaknesses of—current theoretical frameworks in light of evidence obtained in the context of upper-division physics courses. All proposals must include contact information and institutional affiliation of the lead author.

The guest editors will, in consultation with the PRST-PER editor, review proposals and notify authors of the status of their submission by April 30, 2014. Authors of accepted proposals will be asked to prepare manuscripts that will go through the standard PRST-PER review process. Completed draft manuscripts will be due by September 1, 2014. Given the short review cycle, we expect the submitted manuscripts to be complete works. Works in progress or incomplete articles will be returned to the author without review.

Charles Henderson
Editor




Published 17 March 2014
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevSTPER.10.010002
PACS numbers: 01.10.Cr, 01.40.Fk