New Perspectives in Science Education

Throughout a large study on cancer’s representations among pupils from Year 6 to the second year of master [1], we got an interest at the different sources of information on this young public. To do so, we asked the pupils where they first heard about cancer. Cancer is absent of the French curriculum until science specialised year 12, although it is, among any diseases, the most present in the pupils’ mind. This paradoxal situation thus legitimates to question the different sources that structure the representations of this young public.
In a previous work [2], we presented the sources of information of the youngest pupils of our study (year 6 and year 9 pupils), and we compared both levels. In this study, we present the data corresponding to older students (year 12 and Master students) and we propose a general comparison overall the four levels.
Our results show that the family and media spheres stay the two main sources of information on cancer, at every level. Even if information sources seem to be more diverse for older students, television stays largely the predominant medium.
Peers, the scholar sphere and the medical sphere seem to remain of secondary importance.
It is so intriguing that, considering the K, V, P model of Clément P.[3], young adults seem to have constructed their representations of cancer mostly thanks to their interactions within the family and thanks to television. This consideration might partly explain why pupils/students and finally many adults keep a very dark, more or less mythological representation of the disease, which remains far enough from its actual nature.

Keywords: communication, children, school, knowledge, illness;