Socioscientific issues-based instruction is an active approach to learning, placing science content within a social context in a way that supplies both motivation and the ownership of learning to the student.
"Socioscientific issues involve the deliberate use of scientific topics that require students to engage in dialogue, discussion and debate. They are usually controversial in nature but have the added element of requiring a degree of moral reasoning or the evaluation of ethical concerns in the process of arriving at decisions regarding possible resolution of those issues. The intent is that such issues are personally meaningful and engaging to students, require the use of evidence-based reasoning, and provide a context for understanding scientific information." (Zeidler and Nicols, 2009)