UNIVERSITY STUDENTS’ KNOWLEDGE ABOUT EPIGENETICS PERSISTENCE OF GENETIC DETERMINISM

Year 2016, Volume: 4 , 127 - 131, 01.09.2016

Boujemaa Agorram Moncef Zakı Sabah Selmaouı Salah-eddine Khzami

Abstract

In
recent decades, Genetic issues play a large role in health and public policy
and new knowledge in this field continues to have significant implications for
individuals and society. In spite of this increased exposure to genetics,
recent studies of the general public’s genetics knowledge show a relatively low
understanding of genetics concepts. Eepigenetics is a new paradigm in biology.
Nevertheless, the notion of genetic determinism is still present in syllabuses
and textbooks. The present research explores the future Biology teachers’
conceptions related to the genetic determinism of human performances. The
research method is a questionnaire elaborated by the Biohead-Citizen consortium.
The findings revealed  that future
Biology teachers still reducing the biological identity to a genetic program.
The set can also enhance the danger of hereditarian ideology and justifies the
fatalism and racism. We concluded that the teaching of epigenetics becomes a
scientific and citizen challenge.

Keywords

Genetic determinism, Students, conceptions, epigenetics

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