• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
• /
• v.46 no.3
• /
• pp.265-278
• /
• 2002

A concept test was administered to college students and teachers to identify their understanding of chemical equilibrium and equilibrium shift. The subjects were 53 freshmen in the General Chemistry class, 28 juniors in the Physical Chemistry class and 26 seniors from a university and 10 high school teachers in Seoul. Test items include the calculations of partial pressure and concentration of the gas in the mixture, the equilibrium constant cal-culation and the prediction of equilibrium shift when an inert gas is added to the gaseous reaction system, and the equilibrium concentration calculation and the prediction of equilibrium shift when water or common ion is added to the weak acid solution. The test was focused to identify whether the subjects can predict equilibrium shift using the reaction quotient change for the situations in which Le Chatelier principle is difficult to apply. The results showed that the achievements of teachers and juniors were significantly higher than those of freshmen and seniors. Many stu-dents had difficulties in predicting equilibrium shift using the reaction quotient while they could calculate partial pres-sure and concentration for the same situation. It means they are lack of conceptual understanding of chemical equilibrium shift.