Abstract
The results of an investigation concerned with schemes of commonsense knowledge connecting the elements weight, air and gravity to the phenomena of free fall are reported here. The research was conducted on samples of primary school children, secondary school and university students and adults who were non‐experts in physics. It was found that all levels from the secondary education level onwards, alternative commonsense schemes were held by the majority of people, who invoked air as a necessary factor for falling. Primary school children could be shown to hold the belief that the floating of objects on the moon is an experimental fact which may be explained by a force of gravity centred on the Earth.
