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Engineers are often faced with complex problems that require both technical and social expertise. However, typical engineering curricula teach technical skills in isolation, without introducing social issues. To address this gap, we implemented a sociotechnical module that linked the circuits topic of capacitors with the social issue of conflict minerals in a single class session of a large “Introduction to Circuits” course. Using a midterm student feedback survey and student group interviews, we explored students’ responses to the module, their takeaways, and their general attitudes towards sociotechnical content in technical engineering courses. Overall, students found the module to be valuable and relevant, with many noting that it helped them understand real-world engineering practice. While some expressed concern about adding new material to an already content-heavy course, more than half agreed that this type of content is important and that they would like to see more sociotechnical topics in their engineering courses. 

This work-in-progress research paper describes the development and pilot administration of a survey to assess students’ perceptions about sociotechnical issues in engineering. After refining the survey through iterative rounds of review, we piloted it in an “Introduction to Circuits” course at a large, public university in the Midwestern USA in which we deployed a short module addressing technical and social issues. In this paper we document our instrument development process and present descriptive statistics and results of paired t-tests used to analyze the pilot data. We also describe ways our instrument can be implemented by instructors and researchers in multiple contexts.