SCIENCE STUDIES AND SCIENCE EDUCATION Sibel Erduran and John L. Rudolph, Section Coeditors
Reconstruction of the History of the Photoelectric Effect and its Implications for General Physics Textbooks
MANSOOR NIAZ Epistemology of Science Group, Department of Chemistry, Universidad de Oriente, Apartado Postal 90, Cumana,´ Estado Sucre 6101A, Venezuela
STEPHEN KLASSEN Department of Physics, University of Winnipeg, Winnipeg, MB, Canada R3B 2E9
BARBARA McMILLAN Faculty of Education, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, Canada R3T 2N2
DON METZ Faculty of Education, University of Winnipeg, Winnipeg, MB, Canada R3B 2E9
Received 30 May 2009; revised 18 November 2009; 24 November 2009; accepted 2 December 2009
DOI 10.1002/sce.20389 Published online 14 January 2010 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com).
ABSTRACT: The photoelectric effect is an important part of general physics textbooks. To study the presentation of this phenomenon, we have reconstructed six essential, history and philosophy of science (HPS)-related aspects of the events that culminated in Einstein proposing his hypothesis of lightquanta and the ensuing controversy within the scientiÞc community. These aspects are (1) Lenard’s trigger hypothesis to explain the photoelectric
Correspondence to: Mansoor Niaz; e-mail: [email protected]. Contract grant sponsor: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (Canada; CRYSTAL Project) grant at the University of Manitoba. Contract grant sponsor: Maurice Price Foundation.