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failure to "write better Science? Books

Reading today, to clear my head a little, the comments to an annotation usually interesting Pseudopod (a see if you get into that section one of these days) on physical reasons that brought down the World Trade Center buildings on 11-S, a comment Jaime Benito a little off topic got me thinking :

A question for all (and not offend anyone): Why are the only ones I read on the Internet who can write without spelling mistakes are physicists, engineers or the like? "An ironic coincidence? "Only I notice these details when I hear your education? Are the letters do not usually use the Internet for any reason? Toméis not what you wrong, but almost all physicists and engineers with whom I YO I stumbled written with absolute correctness and demonstrate a general culture far superior to the rest, and many who have studied other careers considered letters, including translation, are unable to write without making many spelling mistakes.
PS I'm physical. Pseudopod

overlapped another comment :

But I am also a physicist and I agree with you. At least, with the students I have seen that it is true that science and engineering are expressed orally and in writing better, in general, that the "letters" (including law and social sciences in general). In college I gave a course in which he students of both types, and the written works of the law students on average were much worse than telecommunications engineering, for example. And the strangest thing is that I have spent several times that students write better are immigrants, and English mother tongue (one Moroccan and one Serb has been the best in recent years).

is not the first time I hear or read the comment, but would not surprise me if that was true. I'll try to explain why:

READ Total 197,634 16,280

Students by level of achievement in math and reading in PISA 2006 in Spain
		Under	Middle High
MATH	Under 65,624			28,330 94,032 78
	Middle	31,089 150,265
	High	1,047		38,225 50,747 90,019
	Total		97,760 54,583 229,342	381,685

The above table brings together the English students in PISA 2006 (only in the PV1, which means that it is only an approximation: those who know also know how heavy it is calculated in a precise way , and now I have time) for simplified performance levels (See note below if you are interested enlarge). As expected, despite all the story of Sciences and Letters, the most numerous cells tend to correspond to the diagonal: ie, students tend to make bad worse in both math and reading, media and the mediocre results successful students better in both subjects.

may look better if we use percentages rather than absolute numbers. If we use horizontal percentages:

Total Total

Students by level of achievement in math and reading in PISA 2006 in Spain
		READ
		Under	Middle High
MATH	Under		69.8 30.1 0.8		24.6
	Middle		15.7 76.0	8, 2	51.8
	High	1.2		42.5 56.4 23.6
		25.6 60.1		14.3	100

first thing we see is that fewer students in reading good in Mathematics (14% of the former by 24% of the latter). The second thing that can be tested is that, if we consider only the brightest students an math, four in ten (42.5%) also get good results in reading, while the rest are in the area mediocre (56%). That is, four out of ten students 15 years with good math skills also have them in Reading.

But if we are to vertical percentages, we see that there is exactly the same:

Total Total

Students by level of achievement in math and reading in PISA 2006 in Spain
		READ
		Under	Middle High
MATH	Under		67.1 12.3 0.1		24.0
	Middle		31.8 65.5 29.8		51.8
	High	22.1 1.1		70, 0	23.6
		25.6		60.1 14.3 100

is, for every ten students with good reading skills, seven are also a good mathematical literacy. We're talking about 15 year olds, ie they are in 4 º ESO (I'm talking about the students more competent, naturally) that next year have to choose mode of Secondary Education (for those who do not know, discounting Art very minor, the other options are something like the classic lyrics pure lyrics, mixed and Sciences). Then what happens (as happened in the General Law of Education, 1970) is that it is normal for students with few problems in mathematics tend to go to the modalities of Sciences, are pure or mixed, while it is rare (except vocations clear) that bright students in mathematics are to be pure Free. Reasons of usefulness, maturity, expectations, family pressures, etc.. lead to good students (remember, seven out of ten students with good reading skills have good math skills) to the sciences.

Also, why not say it is more labor camp where one can have a good salary in the world of science than that of letters, where much of the higher charges tend to be vaccinated against meritocracy. I know that everywhere baked beans, but if engineers think that their profession has barriers to success, speaking one day with a degree in family law without lawyers.

is, in my opinion, science tends to attract more good students, who are best written. Furthermore, in the sciences tend to ask more note to enter or, alternatively, be quite hard in the first year, which scares most mediocre students.

So I think it is not surprising that the Science write better, generally speaking, although it is likely that the good student of letters pure write something better than good science students, although there is no special difference if we judge only correction.

As to whether immigrants write better than the locals, says Pseudopod (referring only to his personal experience), I have no explanation (it is an opinion, that is, assertion "afraid to be wrong") that the meritocratic: currently very few immigrants who come to college, and therefore would not be surprising that they were more selected than the natives.

METHODOLOGICAL NOTE: in Mathematics, students good equivalent to levels 5 and 6 of PISA, the mediocre at levels 2, 3 and 4, and the bad to level 1 or below it. For Reading, where there will be level 6 to 2009, include good levels 4 and 5.