The purpose of this study was to: (1) investigate the relationship between the learning approaches of high school students, their prior knowledge, and their attitudes toward chemistry, and their performance on a misconceptions test; and (2) describe and analyze the differences between the responses of students of different learning approaches on the same test. Forty-nine high school students enrolled in two sections of New York State Regents Chemistry classes at a suburban school participated in this study. The Misunderstandings Test about burning and chemical change, Students' Learning Strategies Questionnaire, Attitude toward Chemistry Questionnaire, and Differential Aptitude Tests were used to collect data. The Misunderstandings Test was used twice within an 8-month span; students' responses from the two are discussed. Results demonstrated that students' performance on a misunderstandings pretest and students' learning approaches accounted for a statistically significant proportion of the variance on students' performance on the misunderstandings posttest. The results showed that students who identified themselves as meaningful learners performed better than rote learners on the misunderstandings posttest. (Author/YP)