Attitudes of Alabama biology teachers toward the teaching of evolution and creationism

The purpose of this study was to determine Alabama biology teacher knowledge of evolutionary theory, attitude toward evolution, and emphasis given to evolution and creationism in the classroom. In addition, the importance of evolution and creationism to the biology curriculum and perceived pressure to teach evolution or creationism were investigated. Relationships were also examined between selected variables and teacher emphasis of evolution and creationism.;A questionnaire was used to gather data in a cross-sectional survey methodology. Instruments developed for the study were designed to determine a knowledge of evolutionary theory and attitude toward evolution. Both were tested in pilot studies, and validity information was obtained by interviews with college biology instructors and high school biology teachers. Using Cronbach's Coefficient Alpha, the knowledge of evolutionary theory instrument had a reliability of.911, and the attitude toward evolution instrument had a reliability of.954.;Using the point biserial correlation, teacher emphasis given to evolution (and teacher emphasis of creationism) were each correlated to: (a) knowledge of evolution scores; (b) evolution attitude scores; (c) biology hours completed; (d) years teaching experience; and (e) religious philosophy score from a self-rating scale. Significance of all point biserial correlations was obtained using a special case of the t-test.;The chi-square test was used to determine relationships between teacher emphasis of evolution (and creationism) and: (a) highest degree obtained; and (b) school community size. The contingency coefficient was used to determine the strength of the relationships.;The population studied included biology teachers in all of Alabama's public high schools. Consistent representation of school community was sustained by contacting every public high school in Alabama. From these 383 schools, 243 were represented. These 243 biology teachers were the sample group of the study.