Embryonic stem cell research has a great potential in the medical treatment, which can be used to treat some diseases that are currently unable to cure. At present, the embryonic stem cells are indeed proved in some animal tests that they have the ability for treating some diseases. But, human embryonic stem cell research is a controversial issue. Because it must destroy an original embryo for obtaining human
embryonic stem cells, and the public also concerned about the issue of human cloning. In the policy aspect, all countries in the world face the embryonic stem cell research with different strategies. Some countries fully forbid this research, and some of others allow this kind of research to proceed within regulated restrictions. Many western countries survey the public attitudes on this issue for making their policy. Up to now, researches related to ?the recognition on the embryonic stem cell research? have not been published in Taiwan, which raises a strong motivation of this study. The main purpose in this study is in order to understand the recognition of the junior high school teachers on the human embryonic stem cell research.
Junior high school teachers are the subjects in this study, and the Junior high schools in Taichung City and County are surveyed regions. The cluster sampling method is used to select the target schools. The structural equation modeling theory is applied in this study, and SPSS 12.0 and Amos 7.0 are used in the statistics for analyzing data. There are three latent variables??cultural environment?,?learning motive?, and?the recognition on embryonic stem cell research?constitute the framework of structural equation modeling in this study.
The researching result shows that most junior high school teachers take a positive attitude towards the embryonic stem cell research, and think that we should respect the moral status of an embryo. Personal factors like?teaching field?,?working seniority?,?size of school?,?religion?,?whether heard about embryonic stem or not?and?had ever been heard reports about embryonic stem cell research within three months?all have significant influences on the recognition of embryonic stem cell. The results show that there is a significantly positive correlation between?culture environment?and?learning motive?, and also indicate ? learning motive? can significantly and positively influence the recognition of the junior high school
teachers on the human embryonic stem cell research. However,?culture environment?produces indirectly positive influence on the?the recognition on embryonic stem cell research?through?learning motive?. The educational institution should force teachers to take a study on the education of life science, establish a prescribed credit course of life science and set up a Web learning platform for improving the recognition of teachers on the human embryonic stem cell research. In the future, the government should ask the
opinions from scientists, specialists, public or business companies before setting up the regulations related to human embryo and embryonic stem cell research. This action can make the regulations both suitable for the requirements of business companies and for the standard of morality.
