The Relationship between the University Students’ Level of Metacognitive Thinking and their Ability to Solve Mathematical and Scientific Problems

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between the university students’ metacognition thinking and their ability to solve mathematical and scientific problems. 172 university students were involved in this study. The researchers employed two types of instruments: metacognition awareness inventory, and a mathematical & scientific problem solving test; which was constructed by the researchers. After the collection of data, the researchers ran a suitable statistical analysis. The study has concluded that Petra University students have a medium level of metacognitive thinking, and that the variables of sex, faculty, high school stream, and the current year in the university had no effect on their level of metacognitive thinking. The study has also shown that these students suffer from a lack of ability in solving mathematical and scientific problems; no significance correlation between the level of metacognitive thinking in the overall scale and the ability to solve mathematical and scientific problems. However, there was a significant correlation between a few factors of metacognitive thinking and the ability to solve mathematical problems, and these are: Procedural Knowledge, Evaluation, Fault Picking, and Managing Knowledge; as well as a significant correlation between Fault Picking and the ability to solve both mathematical and scientific problems.

Keywords: metacognitive thinking, problem solving.