The present paper presents a detailed thematic review of the context-based chemistry studies. To achieve this, we employed a matrix earlier developed by C ¸ alik et al. (2005), U¨ nal et al. (2006) and Kurnaz and C ¸ alik (2009) to sum-marize the findings by focusing on insights derived from the related studies. The matrix incorporates the following themes: needs, aims, methodologies, general knowledge claims, and implications for teaching and learning, impli-cations for curriculum development and suggestions for
future research. The general knowledge claims investi-gated in this paper were: (a) positive effects of the context-based chemistry studies, and (b) caveats; both were
examined in terms of students’ attitudes and students’ understanding/cognition. Implications were investigated for practice in context-based chemistry studies, for future research in context-based chemistry studies, and for cur-riculum developers in context-based chemistry studies. Using these categories, each context-based study and
related studies were described within a cell of the matrix. Thus, general trends and the unique features of each study were clearly apparent. The similarities and differences were obvious. What follows is an interpretive account of the context-based studies in chemistry education.