CRITICAL JOURNAL REVIEW

Understanding Adaptation and Natural Selection: Common Misconceptions

(Bülent Keskin, Esra Özay Köse)

Name: Maria Naomi Siregar

NIM : 4193141022

Lecturer: Dra. Meida Nugrahalia, S.Si., M.Sc.

Khairiza Lubis, Ph.D.

Subject: General Biology

S-1 BILINGUAL BIOLOGY EDUCATION / BIOLOGY

THE FACULTY OF MATHEMATICS AND NATURAL SCIENCE

MEDAN STATE UNIVERSITY

OCTOBER 2019

1
 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

In our lives we are never separated from others, which we need them as a complement in
our lives, but before we know who they are and how they are we must be able to adapt to them

first. Individuals are single organisms, without help from others we cannot live perfectly. If we

look at the animals around us, we will see that each animal is uniquely created by God.

Like a horse, buffalo, elephant, Frameworks such as butterflies and grasshoppers God-

given ability for the body that best suits the place and method of adaptation is a form of
environmental adjustment that occurs in new environments not only in humans but also in animals

and plants they must be able to adapt with its environment of living in sustaining life one of the

causes of extinction of living things is the inability of living things to adapt to the environment, for

example, moving a fish that is homemade fish. A few days later the fish that are nourished by the

death of fish caused by the fish are unable to adapt to its new environment it is clear that the

creature life that is not right with the environment will experience extinction of every type of

organism has and requires the environment in a particular environment or a place of living things

with their habitat. The ability to live things to adapt to its environment for living things that can

adapt to their environment that can live longer and the like tends to multiply but living things that

cannot adapt to the environment will become extinct.

Adaptation, in evolutionary terms, is a process that living things can do to become

accustomed to the environment. This is related to evolution because this is a long process, which

happened for many generations. The results of successful adaptation are always beneficial for an

organism, so it is related to the process of natural selection.

Adaptation is a way for organisms to cope with the pressures of their surroundings to

survive. Organisms that are able to adapt will survive, while those who are unable to adapt will
face extinction or a rarity of species.

2
 PREFACE

By giving thanks to the presence of God Almighty, for all His grace, blessings

and guidance that has been bestowed. So that I can finish this paper in a very simple

form and content on time. This paper contains information about adaptations.

Where I compare the journals. It is hoped that this paper can provide information

to all of us, and more knowledge about adaptation in biology.

I realize that this paper is far from perfect, therefore I expect criticism and

suggestions from all parties that are constructive for the sake of the perfection of

this paper.

Finally, I would like to thank all the parties concerned in making this paper.

May God always bless all the work we do. Amen.

Medan, 30 October 2019

MARIA NAOMI SIREGAR

3
 BOOK CONTENT

Executive Summary.............................................................................................................2

Preface...................................................................................................................................3

The Table of Content ..........................................................................................................4

Chapter I: Peliminary..........................................................................................................5

A. Background..............................................................................................................5

B. The Purpose.....................................................................................................................5

C. The Benefit.......................................................................................................................5

D. The Identity of Journal...................................................................................................5

Chapter II: The Summary of Journal ...............................................................................7

Chapter III: Discussion......................................................................................................10

Chapter IV: The Closing...................................................................................................14

Reference.............................................................................................................................15

Attachment....................................................................................................................16-17

4
 CHAPTER I

PRELIMINARY

A. RATIONALIZATION OF THE IMPORTANCE OF THE CJR

Critical jornal review is used to invite readers to evaluate the hournal that

have been published. We can find out whether the journal is worth reding

through criticize-ing it. When we need a reference, the journal can be used as

our reading source in addition to books in studying biology, we should

criticize the journal so that we know which journals are more relevant to be

used as reading sources.

B. The Purposes
1. To fulfill assignments on biology courses.

2. Improving students, abilities in summarizing, analyzing, and comparing

and criticizing journals.

3. Strengthening the reader’s understanding of how living things adapt.

C. The Benefits
1. As a reference how to perfect a journal and find relevant reading

sources.

2. Make students more honed in criticizing a journal.

3. To increase knowledge about biology.

D. The Identity of Journal

1. Main Journal

Title: Understanding Adaptation and Natural Selection: Common Misconceptions

Name of Journal: international journal park academic research in education.

Edition: 1(2)

5
Author: Bülent Keskin, Esra Özay Köse

Publisher: Nature Publishing Group

City of Publication: Turkey

Year of Publication: 24 August 2015

e- ISSN: 2149-1913

Website: https://dergipark.org.tr/en/download/article-file/89481

2. The Second Journal

Title: A review on biological adaptation: with applications in engineering science

Name of Journal: Selforganizology

Edition: 1(1)

Author: Limin Luo, WenJun Zhang

Publisher: Macmillan Publisher7

City of Publication: Guangzhou, China

Year of Publication: 2014

ISSN: -

Website:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/303806021_A_review_on_biological_ada

ptation_with_applications_in_engineering_science

6
 CHAPTER II

SUMMARY OF THE JOURNAL

A. The Introduction

Topics of biology have an enriched potential for concepts (Selvi and

Yağbasan, 2004). Biotechnology, cloning, global warming, recombinant

DNA technology, antibiotic awareness and many others represent the most

actively researched and socially followed topics of biology. And evolution

constitutes a connective basis for all of the foregoing fields of biology

(Grace, 2011). Evolution that can be regarded as central to biology is an

interdisciplinary subject and plays a key role in understanding the basic

subjects of biology including the structure of the cell, cell division,

inheritance, reproduction and so on (Banet and Ayuso, 2003; van Dijk, 2009;

van Dijk and Kattman, 2009). Theory of evolution forms the basis of

biology, and nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution

(Dobzhansky, 1973). Similarly, Gould (1982) likens a biology education not

supported by the theory of evolution to chemistry without a periodic table.

Many researchers argue that it is not possible to understand modern

biology without an understanding of evolution (Bishop and Anderson,

1990; Kose, 2010). Biological evolution is the root cause of the diversity of

life and its common origin, and it is the natural selection that makes it true.

Biological evolution occurs through natural selection that induces a change

in the frequency of alleles in the gene pool. This is also a very slow process.

Natural selection is one of the key reasons underlying transformations in

living beings. The natural selection covers the organisms capable of getting

suited to the environment. Changes in living things cannot efficiently be

understood without the knowledge of adaptation and natural selection.

7
B. The Description of Content

This journal contains an abstract, introduction, method, result and

discussion. This journal discusses understanding adaptation and natural

selection. In the method section, the writer explained the way they collect

their data results. Research that was made to identify biology pre‐service

teachers’ misconceptions about adaptation and natural selection, is an

embedded design of mixed methods research design that collects, analyzes,

and mixes both quantitative and qualitative methods in a single study. The

purpose of the embedded design is to collect quantitative and qualitative

data simultaneously or sequentially but to have one form of data play a

supportive role to the other form of data (Creswell, 2008).

In the results section, the writer shows their data observation by

making it into tables. In table 2, they said that more than half of biology pre‐

service teachers provided wrong answers to 5 questions. Less than 50% of

biology pre‐service teachers ticked up wrong answers to the remaining 3

questions. Nearly 85% of them answered correctly to 1 of 8 questions (8th

question). And in table 3, they said that 41 of 117 students think that

according to the theory of evolution organisms that adapt are the strongest

and healthiest and 33 of 117 students think that the purpose of natural

selection is an adaptation of organisms.

. The results reveal that, in the questionnaire applied to identify

misconceptions in biology pre‐service teachers about adaptation and

natural selection, the teachers ticked up too many wrong answers and that

they carry many misconceptions as reflected by the supporting arguments

accompanying their answers. 66.7% of the students provided wrong

answers to the first question (Table 2). As commonly revealed by the

supporting arguments provided by the students, they wrongly believe that

an organism deliberately suits to the environment through transformation

8
(Table 3). But this is not the case for adaptation. Natural selection increases

the frequency of certain genotypes of available variations, thus allowing the

organism to suit the environment (Hasenekoğlu, 2002). Natural selection

enables the organisms to get suited to the environment they live necessarily

without desire, effort, and experimentation (Understanding Evolution,

2013). The environment in which the organism lives defines the

predominant aspect of the adaptive changes. The organism's desire to suit a

particular aspect has no relevance (Gregory, 2009).

9
 CHAPTER III

DISCUSSION

A. Discussion of the content

1. Abstract

In the abstract section of the main journal, the writer tells about the main

purpose of making the journal and that there are misconceptions about the

mechanism and purpose of adaptation and natural selection. The writer also tell the

parts that will be discussed in the journal.

In the second journal, the abstract parts, the writer writes about the definition

of biological adaptation in a short way. Like what adaptation refers to. In the first

journal, it refers to the misconceptions of adaptation and natural selection, while in

the second journal it refers to the definition.

2. Introduction

The introduction section in the main journal explained the significant concept

of teaching is required due to consideration in the learning process. Misconception

can be defined as a set of information not consistent with scientific facts acquired by

students before or during the educational period. Students need to understand the

content of natural and applied sciences. This is the only way of interpreting their

own natural world and developing essential explanations for any phenomena they

encounter.

In the second journal, the introduction part, the writer tells about the

biological phenomenon that happened. The writer also gives examples of the

biological phenomenon attributed to biological adaptation. And explain the theory

of evolution and adaptation based on the theory of the influential person in biology.

10
3. Methods

From the main journal, the writer describes how they do and get their

journal data. They did the survey through making a design first and then

they made a study group to understand more about the data that have

been collected. The data collection tool used in this research created by

the researcher himself considering misconceptions located in the

literature (Fahrenwald, 1999; Gregory, 2009; Köse, 2010; Pazza, Penteado

and Kavako, 2010; Rutledge and Warden, 1999; Understanding

Evolution, 2013; Varela, 2009; Yates, 2011). In the beginning, a

questionnaire that has 9 items was created considering common

misconceptions addressed in the literature. 2 professors, 1 associate

professor and 1 assistant professor all in biology reviewed the items in

order to validate the questionnaire. Due to their comments 1 item

removed from the questionnaire and 1 item was corrected.

Misconceptions about adaptation and natural selection questionnaires are

consist of 8 false‐true items (Table 1). Cronbach's alpha coefficient of the

questionnaire was found to be 0.83. In a two‐tier diagnostic questionnaire,

the first tier of the items consists of a content question, while the second

tier elicits a reasoning response. The purpose of the second tier arranged

in an open‐ended structure is to measure the reasoning ability of students

better and to be able to determine whether they have alternative

misconceptions another than previously determined (Mann and

Treagust, 1998; Voska and Heikkinen, 2000).

The second journal. In the second journal the writer doesn’t really wite

about how they do their observation.

11
 4. Results

In the first journal, the writer made the results of the first tier of the

misconceptions about adaptation and natural selection questionnaire in a

table. When Table 2 is analyzed nearly 80% of biology pre‐service teachers

provided wrong answers to 1 of 8 questions (5th question). Nearly 70% of

them provided wrong answers to 1 of 8 questions (2nd question). Nearly

60% of them provided wrong answers to 3 of 8 questions (1st, 4th, and 6th

questions). The answers given to the second tier of the misconceptions

about adaptation and natural selection questionnaires are read one by one

and obtained misconceptions are listed in Table 3. When Table 3 is

analyzed most common misconceptions can be seen. Nearly half of the

students have the misconception that natural selection is seen in living

organisms who want to adapt to life. And another 49 of 117 students think

that natural selection always chooses the best for organisms.

The second journal also doesn’t have a result section.

5. Discussion.

In the discussion part of the first journal, the writer explains again about

the misconception, more about the result that they got one-by-one and

then also explain why adaptation by natural selection is one of the most

widely misunderstood scientific processes.

The second journal does not have a discussion part, but it has a summary

part that says biological adaptation has always been the focus of

biological evolution, both are inextricably linked.

B. The Strength and Weakness

Based on the discussion section, it can show the quality of these two journals:

1. From the aspect of the scope of the article content, both of the journals are

quite good. The title of the journal is related to the theme and also the

12
 discussion. But, in the first journal, the writer makes the table of the result so

that it can help us to understand the method that they used.

2. Based on the systematic writing of the journal, the main journal is better and

more systematic. The first journal makes all the writing look organized while

in the second journal, all of the paragraphs looked like it has been mixed up

so the reader can actually get confused while reading the journal.

3. From the grammatical aspect, both of the journals used language that is not

so hard to be able to understand by the reader. Even though the second

journal almost look like “a” paragraph/ summary, but it uses easy words that

can be understood by the reader.

4. Based on the appearance, the main journal looks more interesting because it

has color(other than black) and looks neater if compare to the second book

that is more monotonous and too crowded so it looks less interesting.

13
 CHAPTER IV

CLOSING

A. Conclusion

Both journals are related to adaptation. But, in the first journal discuss

the misconception and in the second journal discuss the definition, the theories,

etc. both of journal are good to be used together.

B. Recommendation

First I want to give a suggestion to the second journal writer to put

discussion, method and result in the journal in order to complete the

journal. Also recommendation to the reader to read the journal

together so that we know the definition of adaptation and how not to

misconception the adaptation.

14
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Keskin, Bülent. , Köse, Esra Özay.2015.

Understanding Adaptation and Natural Selection: Common Misconceptions.

International Journal Park Academic Research in Education.1(2):53-63

15
ATTACHMENT

16
17