Lukas Perikleous' thesis, "They were not as rational as we are today": Students' and teachers' ideas of historical empathy in Greek Cypriot Primary Education, explores how primary school students and teachers in Cyprus understand and explain historical practices. Conducted at the UCL Institute of Education in 2022, the study investigates historical empathy by analyzing explanations of past human behavior. The research involved 63 students aged 8 to 12 and five teachers from a primary school in Nicosia, who completed written tasks and participated in interviews about past and present healing practices. Through qualitative data analysis, the study developed a typology of explanations and a progression model to assess historical empathy. The findings show that older students tend to have a more sophisticated understanding of historical empathy than younger ones, while teachers, although generally more advanced, sometimes hold misconceptions. The study also reveals that temporal distance, meaning the difference between past and present, significantly influences students’ historical explanations, whereas cultural distance, meaning whether the historical actors belonged to the students’ own culture or a foreign one, has little effect. These insights confirm prior research on historical empathy and introduce a new progression model that can serve both diagnostic and pedagogic purposes. The study highlights the importance of professional development for teachers to address potential misconceptions and suggests that history education should include diverse historical topics and inquiry-based learning to foster historical empathy. The findings contribute to both local and international discussions on history education, offering implications for curriculum design and teacher training, while also emphasizing the role of historical education in shaping students' perspectives on the past.
Read the publication here.
[Informations provided by Marina Kyprianou]
