Marlee Olsen, Snow College
Psychology
This study focuses on how college students interpret and understand new knowledge. Participants will be answering a number of questions via survey about their personal beliefs such as religion, reliable sources of knowledge, and other possible mitigating factors. After reviewing existing research, we found studies being done over long-term acceptance of beliefs, and also studies of the affects on understanding and acceptance of new beliefs after exposure to relative information. However as we reviewed the literature we found lacking information specifically regarding whether college students, when exposed to new concepts, accept the information before understanding it, or postpone acceptance until further understanding. The survey will be given out to students in different geographic regions across the nation to obtain various religious backgrounds, race, gender, and geographic background. We project to find a correlation between religiosity and the rate of acceptance of new beliefs before understanding. Other mitigating factors such as ratings for source of knowledge and geographic background are expected to also have affects. Results will be discussed.