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p-ISSN: 2722-399X;  e-ISSN: 2722-1857 
SiLeT, Vol. 2, No. 3, December 2021: 1-9 

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and Teaching 

 

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The Effectiveness of Problem Based Learning (PBL) Based 
Socioscientific Issue (SSI) to Improve Critical Thinking Skills  

*M N Fita1, B Jatmiko2, E Sudibyo3  
1Science Education Study Program, Postgraduate Program, Universitas Negeri Surabaya, Indonesia 

2Department of Physics, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Science, Universitas Negeri Surabaya, Indonesia 
3Department of Science, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Science, Universitas Negeri Surabaya, Indonesia 

Article Info  ABSTRACT  

Article history: 

Received July 29, 2021 
Revised August 29, 2021 
Accepted September 9, 2021 
Available Online December 30, 2021 

The purpose of this research was to see how effective the Problem 
Based Learning (PBL) based Socioscientific Issues (SSI) is at 
improving critical thinking skills. The sample used was grade seven 
in junior high school 4 Lamongan with 2 classes and each class 
contains 15 students. The design of the learning materials trial used  
One-Group pre-test post-test design. Tests of critical thinking skills 
and student answer sheets were used to collect data. Techniques of 
data analysis used N-gain, paired t-test, and independent t-test. The 
result of this research is as follows: The effectiveness in terms of the 
critical thinking skills test the category increase is high, there is a 
significant difference between the test before and after learning 
with PBL based SSI and there is no difference N-gain in the two 
group classes and students' responses are classified as very good. 
Based on data analysis, it can be concluded that PBL with SSI is 
effective to improve critical thinking skills. The implications of this 
study are PBL-based SSI has the potential to be an innovative 
solution and alternative for improving critical thinking skills. 

Keywords: 

Critical thinking skills 

Effective 
PBL model 
SSI 
Student response 

 
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INTRODUCTION 
The development of technology, information, and industry in the 21st century has had a 
significant impact on society. Culture and lifestyle are strongly influenced by electronic devices 
which make information accessible freely so that the teacher's role as a source of information 
can not be maintained. Rapid changes in information technology are changing and reshaping 
society and giving birth to new terms. One of the new terms is the information age society. In an 
information society, individuals must understand, interpret, and use scientific data; generate 
new ones, and have the ability to solve problems (Demirel, 2009). Apart from that, current 
developments also have an impact on job opportunities that can be obtained by school 
graduates. Now and future, jobs do not require routine work but rather skills that cannot be 
replaced by technology. If we do not adapt to the changes that occur, then we can not compete 
in the present era. The world of education must also change the education system so that school 
graduates can survive in the future. Indonesian education has made efforts to improve 
education by implementing the 2013 curriculum, which has student-centered learning. The 2013 
curriculum focuses on the development of Critical, Creative, Communication, Collaboration 
(4C) skills, that need to be applied in learning, one of which is science learning. 

In science learning, critical thinking skills are one of the 4C's abilities that need to be 
developed. Critical thinking is defined as a set of skills and dispositions that enable a person to 
solve problems logically, reasonedly in making decisions about what to believe or not believe, 
and attempt to think independently by balancing the problem-solving process (Ennis 1993; 

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Gotoh, 2016). Critical thinking skills are very important in the information and technology era 
where information must be filtered intelligently and critically. Critical thinking skills are 
considered a vital skill for the 21st century, so they are the educational outcomes desired by 
educators (Tosuncuogl, 2018). Critical thinking skills need to be applied in all learning 
processes, because it develops students' ability to carry out complex cognitive reasoning 
processes, which include critical thinking, solving non-routine problems, and building and 
evaluating evidence-based arguments (Santos, 2017). 

Based on a preliminary study conducted at SMP Negeri 4 Lamongan by giving critical 
thinking skills with indicator critical thinking Facione (2011) interpretation, analysis, 
explanation, inference, and evaluation questions to 29 students, it was found that students' 
critical thinking skills were still low. The ability to think critically at interpretation is 20.0%, 
analysis 24.8%, inference 13.8%, explaining 32.2%, and evaluation 20.6%. 

Based on the results of the preliminary study, students' critical thinking skills need to be 
improved. Students' critical thinking skills can be developed using the Problem Based Learning 
(PBL) model. PBL is a basic process for identifying problems, considering options and making 
informed choices (Greenstein, 2012). PBL is a learning model that increases students' active 
participation in the learning process by exposing them to real-world problems and empowering 
them to conduct investigations (Arends, 2013) so that it can help students develop higher-order 
thinking skills like critical thinking, knowledge construction, collaborative learning, and 
independent learning (Orozco & Yangco, 2016). PBL learning has the advantages: 1) 
Encouraging teamwork in the completion of assignments 2) Encouraging learners to become 
self-regulatory and independent learners 3) Fostering critical thinking and interpersonal 
abilities (Arends, 2013). 

PBL learning can be integrated with Socioscientific Issues (SSI). SSI is a complicated, open, 
mostly contentious, and socially significant scientific problem with multiple possible solutions 
but no definitive answers. (Topcu, 2010; Zeidler et al., 2011). Give place of SSI in science 
education aims to provide a more meaningful learning experience by integrating to real-life 
problems. (Topcu, 2010). Scientific data can be critically analyzed, evaluated, and decision-
making with SSI integration (Bossér et al., 2015). 

The material used in the PBL based SSI can be found in the global context of environmental 
issues such as climate change or global warming. The increase in the average temperature of the 
earth's surface that continues to occur due to human activities is one of the causes of the 
material importance of global warming. Many daily activities from various sectors such as 
transportation, industry, agriculture, and forestry sectors contribute to climate change so that 
the future ecological balance is disturbed. To prevent disturbing the ecological balance, consider 
the importance of educating conscious individuals about the environment. 

Based on results by Orozco and Yangco (2016), students who receive learning instruction 
with PBL had a higher post-test average score on critical thinking skills tests than students who 
do not receive learning instruction with PBL. SSI integration has the potential to provide 
students with opportunities to critically examine and evaluate scientific information and to 
engage in debate and decision-making (Bossér et al., 2015). The supporting learning theory is 1) 
According to Piaget's learning theory, children have a natural curiosity that encourages them to 
actively form representations in their minds about the environment they experience, so 
encouraging them to start an investigation. 2) Constructivist theory of learning, which 
emphasizes the need for students to investigate their environment, find their own ideas, and 
construct their knowledge (Arends, 2013; Suprihatiningrum, 2014). 3) Vygotsky's theory which 
emphasizes the social aspects of learning can be seen in PBL learning at the organizational stage 
of students' learning and investigations to complete tasks by exchanging ideas or sharing tasks. 

The purpose of this study is to describe the effectiveness of the SSI-based PBL model in 
improving critical thinking skills, including student responses and critical thinking skills. 

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RESEARCH METHOD  
This study used a design One Group pre-test post-test design (Sugiyono, 2016). The research 
subject is seven grade students junior high school with 2 classes and each class contains 15 
students. The research design can be described as follows 
 

 
Figure 1. Research design 

(Sugiyono, 2016). 
Information: 
O1 : Pre-test, to determine students' knowledge before being given treatment 
X : Treatment, learning process with PBL model-based SSI 
O2 : Post-test, to determine students' final knowledge after being given treatment 
 
This is the development stage of material adapted to the 4-D models with modification, for 
more detail, see figure 2. 

 

 
Figure 2. Flowchart 4-D Models 

 
A test sheet for critical thinking skills and student responses was utilized to assess the 
effectiveness of PBL-based SSI. A test and a questionnaire were used as the methods. The 
results of the critical thinking test were analyzed using normalized Gain analysis (N-gain) to 
determine the increase in critical thinking skills, paired t-test to determine the significant 
increase in critical thinking skills pretest and post-test with t-test results sig < 0.05, and an 
independent t-test to determine whether the N-gain of the two classes were not significantly 

O1    X     O2 

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different with t-test results sig ≥ 0.05. PBL-based SSI is declared effective if the increase in the 
critical thinking skill test score is 0.31, the paired t-test with sig value < 0.05, and the 
independent test has a significance value of ≥ 0.05 and student responses get a percentage of > 
60%. 

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION  
Critical Thinking Skills 
Students' critical thinking skills were assessed by a written test in the form of an essay, which 
was carried out twice, before and after learning with PBL based SSI. After that, the pre-test and 
post-test were analyzed using N-gain score. The following are the results of the N-gain analysis 
of the two classes which can be seen in Table 1. 

Table 1. N-gain Critical Thinking Skills 

Class Pre-test Post-test N-Gain 

VII-E 15,83 76,17 0.72 
VII-F 19,83 78,00 0.73 

 Based on Table 1. students in class VII-E got an average N-gain critical thinking score of 
0.72 with a high category, while students in class VII-F got an N-gain critical thinking score of 
0.73 with a high category. PBL based SSI is declared effective because the increase in the critical 
thinking skill test score is ≥ 0.31. The number of students who got N-Gain in the high, medium, 
and low categories in both classes are presented in Figure 3. 

 
Figure 3. Criteria for N-gain 

 Based on Figure 3 it is known in class VII-E, 13 students in the high category and 2 students 
in the medium category, while in class VII-F has 10 students in the high category and 5 students 
in the medium category. This shows that learning with PBL based SSI can improve students' 
critical thinking skills. The improvement of students 'critical thinking skills varies due to the 
students' ability to absorb different information. Students' ability to solve problems is 
influenced by intelligence (intelligence). Because if students have high intelligence, they can 
quickly solve the problems faced and vice versa with students who have low intelligence 
(Bagia, 2016). Guiterez (2011) improves students' critical thinking skills through the integration 
of SSI problems in learning. Before the statistical test is carried out, it is necessary to test the 
normality with SPSS, the results of which are shown in Table 2. 

Table 2. Tests of Normality 

 
Class 

Shapiro-Wilk 

Statistic Df Sig. 

N-gain 
VII-E .897 15 .086 
VII-F .960 15 .692 

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

VII-E VII-F

N-gain Achievement Criteria

Sedang

Tinggi

Medium 

High 

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According to Table 2, the normality of the N-gain test for class VII-E is 0.086 and class VII-F 
is 0.692. The test results of the two classes obtained a probability (sig)> 0.05. As a result, Ho is 
acceptable, meaning that the data is normally distributed. Because the data were normally 
distributed, the data were also analyzed using a paired t-test and can be seen in Table 3.  

Table 3. Paired t-test  

  Mean Std. Deviation t Df Sig. (2-tailed) 

VII-E Pre-test - Post-test -6.03333E1 4.41858 -52.884 14 .000 

VII-F Pre-test - Post-test -5.81667E1 5.78380 -38.950 14 .000 

Based on the paired t-test, it shows that the sig value in both classes is 0.000. This shows the 
sig value < 0.05, and t is negative, which means that there is a significant difference between the 
results of the pre-test and post-test, so that there is an effect of using the PBL based SSI learning 
model on improving students' critical thinking. These findings are supported by Amin et al., 
(2020), who found that the PBL model had a significant impact on students' critical thinking 
skills. There are significant differences in critical thinking skills before and after the application 
of PBL learning (Lapuz & Fulgencio, 2020). 

PBL can help students increase their soft skills, such as critical thinking. (Suryanti & 
Supeni, 2019). According to other researchers, the PBL-based SSI model has a considerable 
impact on critical thinking skills development and cognitive learning outcomes (Wilsa et al., 
2017), and using the SSI problem as a learning context has a significant effect on students' 
critical thinking skills (Pratiwi et al., 2016). Zeidler et al. (2011) give a place for SSI in science 
education, students' can make ability decisions, analyze, synthesize, and evaluate. Fadilah MS 
et al., (2020) statement that learning designed with a student-centered model will improve 
critical thinking skills and make students motivated in learning. Student-centered learning can 
insert aspects of critical thinking and give more meaning to learning to provide high-quality 
learning on aspects of critical thinking (Ahaddin et al., 2020). 

 This result is supported by the theory of Piaget is children have an innate nature of 
curiosity, this curiosity will encourage them to actively construct representations in their minds 
about the environment they experience so that they will be encouraged to carry out 
investigations. According to Piaget, learning is a process of acquiring individual knowledge 
through continuous interaction with the environment. Interaction with the environment, the 
intellectual function is growing (Dimyati & Mudjiono, 2008). 

 In addition to improving critical thinking skills, PBL based SSI has benefits in the social 
aspects of cooperation. Vygotsky's theory which emphasizes the social aspects of learning can 
be seen in PBL based SSI learning at the organizational stage of students' learning and 
investigation. At this stage, the social aspect of working together and discussing with peers 
occurs to complete tasks or problem solving by exchanging opinions or sharing tasks so that 
their critical thinking skills can improve through controversial issues of daily life. Vygotsky 
argued that in addition to teachers, peers also affect the cognitive development process of 
children (Slavin, 2011). Kardoyo et al., (2020) stated that PBL can improve students' critical 
thinking skills and students with their groups can work together to solve problems. The next 
test is the homogeneity test, which is shown in Table 4. 

Tabel 4. Test of Homogeneity  

  Levene Statistic df1 df2 Sig. 

N-gain 

Based on Mean 1.441 1 28 .240 

Based on Median 1.380 1 28 .250 

Based on Median and with adjusted df 1.380 1 27.979 .250 

Based on trimmed mean 1.513 1 28 .229 

Based on Table 4, it is obtained a significant value of 0.240. This value is following the 
testing criteria, if the probability value (sig) is more than 0.05 then H0 is accepted, which means 

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that the N-gain data of the two classes are homogeneous. The data are normally distributed and 
homogeneous, so an independent t-test can be performed.  

Table 5.  Independent t-test 
  t-test for Equality of Means 

  t F Sig. (2-tailed) 
N-gain Equal variances assumed -.389 8 .700 

 In addition, an independent t-test was also carried out in this study. An independent t-test 
was used to determine the difference in the N-gain of the two classes. Based on table 5, it can be 
seen that the significant value is ≥ 0.05 so there is no significant difference in the N-gain 
between classes VII-E and VII-F. Critical thinking skills for both classes have improved because 
they use the same tool, namely PBL based SSI, and both classes' learning implementation was 
great. 

Student Response 
Student response is a response or reaction of students after participating in learning. The results 
of student responses to learning activities using the SSI-based PBL model were obtained using 
student response questionnaires. Student response questionnaires are given at the end of 
learning to students after participating in the entire learning process. Learning equipment is 
stated to be practical if the student's response is ≥ 61% (Riduwan, 2013). The results of student 
responses to learning can be seen in Table 5. 

Table 5. Student Response 

No Statement 

VII-E VII-F 

Response (%) Response (%) 

Yes No Yes No 

1 The learning process of the PBL based SSI was 
interesting and fun 

100,0 0,0 93,3 6,7 

2 I am more active in learning the SSI-based PBL model 80,0 20,0 93,3 6,7 
3 SSI based PBL learning model gives me motivated and 

makes meaningful learning 
80,0 20,0 86,7 13,3 

4 The learning process aroused my curiosity 86,7 13,3 93,3 6,7 
5 By forming groups for learning, I can more easily study 

and discuss with my friends during learning 
100,0 0,0 100,0 0,0 

6 Learning materials are related to everyday life so that it 
makes me understands more in everyday life 

100,0 0,0 93,3 6,7 

7 The presentation and display of the worksheets is 
interesting and motivating to learn 

86,7 13,3 80,0 20,0 

8 Student textbooks, the learning atmosphere, the way the 
teacher taught in learning was interesting and made it 
easier for me 

93,3 6,7 93,3 6,7 

9 Learning PBL based on SSI allows me to improve my 
critical thinking skills 

93,3 6,7 86,7 13,3 

10 The test questions given are in accordance with the 
material that has been taught 

93,3 6,7 100,0 0,0 

11 Student worksheets and textbooks use language that is 
easy to understand 

86,7 13,3 86,7 13,3 

 Average 90,9 9,1 91,5 8,5 

Based on Table 5, explains that students give a positive response to learning using the SSI-
based PBL model with each class obtaining an average percentage of 90.9% for class VII-E with 
the very good category and 91.5% for class VII- F with very good category. Learning material is 
stated effective if the student's response is ≥ 61% (Riduwan, 2013). Each individual has a 
different perception due to different perspectives, experiences, and knowledge of a particular 

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object so that they respond according to what they experience. These results are supported by 
the results of device validation which are generally categorized as valid and very valid and the 
implementation of the two classes of learning is also carried out very well. To create positive 
relationships with students, the way the teacher speaks and acts must reflect a teacher who 
respects and must ensure that all students are treated equally so that students respond 
positively to activities and learning model updates that are carried out. outside the classroom 
during the learning process (Alfiyanti et al., 2020). 

Students give a positive response to learning because the PBL based SSI learning process is 
interesting and fun by forming groups in learning so that students can be more active, easier to 
learn, and discuss with friends during learning. This is supported by Hmelo-Silver's (2004) 
statement that PBL facilitates small groups, tutorial instruction, and active learning. Members of 
the group must work together to ensure that everyone participates fully, no single person has a 
monopoly on assignments and discussions (Silva et al., 2018). Vygotsky's theory emphasizes the 
social aspects of learning which can be seen in PBL based SSI learning at the organizational 
stage of students in learning and investigation. At this stage, students will conduct 
investigations to solve problems related to science and social so that interaction and social care, 
and critical thinking skills will develop. According to Thakur et al., (2018), 80.0 percent of 
students believe that PBL gives space for social interaction because of its collaborative 
approach, which is built on the idea of peer discussion and learning, therefore developing 
learning confidence. 

Students also gave positive responses to SSI-based PBL statements which enabled me to 
improve my critical thinking skills. This is because learning with the PBL model can develop 
students' critical thinking skills (Kong et al., 2014) and SSI integration in learning has the 
potential to allow students to critically examine and evaluate scientific information (Bossér et 
al., 2015).  

CONCLUSION  
Based on the results, it shows that PBL-based SSI learning is effective to improve critical 
thinking skills. This is indicated by the average N-gain of the two classes in the high category, a 
statistically significant increase at 5% alpha and the mean N-gain is not different for the two 
classes. Furthermore, both classes responded positively, with a very good category. This 
research implies that the learning model of PBL based SSI can be an innovative solution and 
alternative for improving critical thinking skills. Further research with additional relevant 
materials and more subjects could enhance this research even more. 

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS  
The author is grateful to the all-academic civitas of Junior High School 4 Lamongan for allowing 
data collection. 

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Author (s): 

* Muflichatu Nur Fita (Corresponding Author) 
Science Education Study Progam, Postgraduate Program, 
Universitas Negeri Surabaya, 
Jl. Raya Kampus Unesa, Lidah Wetan, Lakarsantri, Surabaya 60213, Indonesia 

Email: muflichatu.18040@mhs.unesa.ac.id  

 

Budi Jatmiko  
Department of Physics, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Science, 
Universitas Negeri Surabaya, 
Jl. Ketintang, Surabaya 60231, Indonesia 
Email: budijatmiko@unesa.ac.id  

 

Elok Sudibyo 
Department of Science, Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Science, 
Universitas Negeri Surabaya, 
Jl. Ketintang, Surabaya 60231, Indonesia 
Email: eloksudibyo@unesa.ac.id  

 

https://doi.org/10.46627/silet.v2i3.71
https://scie-journal.com/index.php/SiLeT
https://doi.org/10.5430/ijhe.v8n8p62
https://doi.org/10.1080/09500791003628187
https://doi.org/10.15294/jise.v6i1.17072
mailto:muflichatu.18040@mhs.unesa.ac.id
mailto:budijatmiko@unesa.ac.id
mailto:eloksudibyo@unesa.ac.id

