This study investigated the relationships between how students listen to (access existing posts) and speak in (contribute posts) asynchronous online discussions. The researchers found that when students take the time to read and reread peers' posts, there are related benefits in the quality of the posts they contribute, particularly in terms of responsiveness and argumentation. However, no effects were found for the breadth of listening behaviors. The researchers suggest making discussion groups smaller and providing guidance to students on effective listening behaviors to support higher quality speaking in discussions. More research is needed to examine these relationships in different discussion contexts.

1. Connecting Students’ Listening and
Speaking Behaviors in Asynchronous
Online Discussions
Supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
AERA 2013, San Francisco CA
Alyssa Friend Wise, Yuting Zhao
& Simone Hausknecht

2. Overview
• Investigation of relationships between how students
listen (access existing posts) and speak (contribute
posts) in asynchronous online discussions
• Interrelationship between these processes important
to understand how discussions live up to / fall short of
potential for supporting knowledge construction
• Found that when students take the time to read and
reread peers’ posts there are related benefits in
the quality of the posts they contribute; however
no effects were found for breadth of listening

3. Online “Listening” and “Speaking”
• From a social constructivist perspective, the goal
of online discussions is for learners to build
understanding through dialoging with other
• This involves 2 basic interrelated processes:
SPEAKING
Externalizing one’s ideas by contributing posts to an
online discussion
LISTENING
Taking in the externalizations of others by accessing
existing posts
Theoretical Framework
(NOT LURKING!)

4. Student Online “Listening” Patterns
• Past work shows students “listen” in varied,
multiple, distinct ways
– Thorough, Independent, Self-Monitoring learners
(Wise et al., 2011a)
– Superficial, Concentrated and Broad listeners
(Wise et al., 2011b)
– Disregardful, Social, Coverage, Targeted, Interactive,
(Wise et al., 2012)
But (how) do these listening patterns relate to
students’ speaking behaviors?
Theoretical Framework

5. Dimensions of Speaking Quality
Dimension Category Definition (The extent to which posts…)
Discursivity Responsiveness …respond to prior posts by acknowledging
other’s ideas and expanding and challenging
and synthesizing them.
Elicitation …request a response from peers by asking
questions of individuals or the collective.
Content Argumentation …consider content by making claims about the
material which may be supported by reasoning /
evidence, and qualifications.
Reflectivity Individual …address the development of a students’ own
ideas on a topic / process of knowledge
formation.
Group …address how the groups’ ideas change over
time / process of knowledge construction.
Theoretical Framework

6. Research Questions
What listening behaviors are associated with:
1. the discursiveness of students’ posts in terms of
responsiveness and elicitation?
2. the depth of content of students’ posts in terms of
argumentation?
3. the reflectivity of students’ posts in terms of
individual and group reflection?
Research Questions

7. Dimensions of Listening Behavior
Dimension Definition
Breadth The quantity of unique posts one views - important in terms
of the diversity of ideas a learner is exposed to.
Depth The length of time spent reading posts – important to allow
for deeper consideration of others’ ideas.
Temporal
Contiguity
The degree to which learners disperse or concentrate their
participation - important for integration and development over
time.
Revisitation The extent to which students return to posts made by
themselves and others – important in connecting ideas
across the discussion over time.
Methods

8. Learning Environment
• Fully online course
– Educational Psychology
– Undergraduate students (31/52)
• 6 week-long discussions with 8-10 classmates
– Contested real world teaching questions (e.g. ability tracking)
– Given contrasting perspectives, come to consensus
– Require 2 posts on different days, 20% of grade.
– Basic open-source asynchronous threaded forum
Methods

9. Listening – Processing Log-file Data
Date Time Session Action Duration
(min)
Length
(words)
Message #
6/3/2011 23:46 1 Read 44.43 413 447
6/3/2011 23:52 1 Read 1.73 60 455
6/4/2011 00:08 1 Scan 0.23 117 459
6/4/2011 00:09 1 Read 12.51 413 460
6/4/2011 23:49 2 Post 3.18 120 477
• Actions: View (read or scan), Post, Review (and edit)
– Scan vs. Read (6.5 words per second threshold) (Hewitt 2003)
• Session closed when action length > 60 min
• Summary variables calculated for each student-week
Methods

10. Listening – Variables Calculated
Dimensions Variables (calc’d per discussion week)
Breadth • Percentage of others’ posts viewed
• Percentage of others’ posts read
Depth • Percentage of real reads
• Average length of real reads (min)
Temporal
Contiguity
• Number of sessions
• Percentage of sessions with posts
• Participation range (days)
Revisitation • Reviews of own posts
• Reviews of instructors’ posts
• Reviews of other’ posts
Methods

11. Speaking – Content Analysis
All 479 posts coded by two researchers, avgs. calc’d per discussion week
Responsiveness [k = 0.71]
0 None
1 Acknowledging
2 Responding to an idea
3 Responding to multiple ideas
Elicitation [k = 0.91]
0 None
1 Questions not clearly directed
2 Questions directed to one person
3 Questions directed to the group
Argumentation [k = 0.74]
0 No argumentation
1 Unsupported argumentation (Position only)
2 Simple argumentation (Position + Reasoning)
3 Complex argumentation (Position + Reasoning + Qualifier/Rebuttal)
Individual Reflection [k = 0.83]
0 No individual reflection
1 Shallow individual reflection
2 Deep individual reflection
Group Reflection [k = 0.75]
0 No group reflection
1 Shallow group reflection
2 Deep group reflection
Methods

12. Statistical Analysis
• Multi-level mixed-model linear regressions for
each of the 5 speaking variables on
– Predicted relevant listening variables (fixed effects)
– Group, week, and post-count variables (random effects)
• Discussion week as unit of activity
(behaviors within a student may change across discussion time)
• Backwards elimination
– p < .1 threshold for inclusion (except for post count variables)
– p < .05 threshold for interpretation
Methods

13. Summary Statistics
• Discussions ranged from 13 to 52 posts total
• Great diversity in individual listening behaviors
– Minimal participation (very few log-ins and reads)
– Extremely active (many visits, all posts read 1+ times)
• Overall level of speaking quality
– Responsiveness was moderate
– Argumentation was high
– Elicitation, Individual- and Group- Reflection were low
Results

14. Connecting Speaking and ListeningEstimate Standard Error t value
Responsiveness # of Posts per group -0.018 0.009 -2.06*
# of Posts per student 0.021 0.031 0.68
Reviews of other’ posts 0.013 0.005 2.50*
Elicitation # of Posts per group -0.001 0.007 -0.19
# of Posts per student 0.047 0.035 1.34
Reviews of other’ posts -0.016 0.006 -2.65*
Argumentation # of Posts per group -0.003 0.009 -0.33
# of Posts per student -0.041 0.024 -1.71
Percentage of real reads 0.522 0.257 2.03*
Individual
Reflection
# of Posts per group -0.000 0.004 -0.10
# of Posts per student -0.024 0.017 -1.40
Reviews of other’ posts 0.005 0.003 1.66
Group Reflection # of Posts per group -0.003 0.005 -0.51
# of Posts per student -0.017 0.015 -1.17
Regression Results

15. Connecting Speaking and Listening
Speaking Listening
Responsiveness
Elicitation
Argumentation
Reflection
revisiting others’ posts
# of posts per group
revisiting others’ posts
% of real reads
revisiting others’ posts?
Discussion

16. Connecting Speaking and Listening
Speaking Listening
Responsiveness
Elicitation
Argumentation
Reflection
revisiting others’ posts
# of posts per group
revisiting others’ posts
% of real reads
revisiting others’ posts?
Discussion
It may be beneficial to
make groups
small, thus keeping
discussions at a
manageable size
The richer end of the
responsive spectrum
tends to occur when
posts are attended to
multiple times

17. Connecting Speaking and Listening
Speaking Listening
Responsiveness
Elicitation
Argumentation
Reflection
revisiting others’ posts
# of posts per group
revisiting others’ posts
% of real reads
revisiting others’ posts?
Discussion
Clarified questions or
doubts by rereading
posts so don’t need to
ask as many questions.
When learner’s ask
questions to the group
they focus their energy
on replies versus
rereading for
understanding
Two possibilities

18. Connecting Speaking and Listening
Speaking Listening
Responsiveness
Elicitation
Argumentation
Reflection
revisiting others’ posts
# of posts per group
revisiting others’ posts
% of real reads
revisiting others’ posts?
Discussion
Deep attention to
peers’ posts can
support a richer
understanding and
stronger
argumentation

19. Connecting Speaking and Listening
Speaking Listening
Responsiveness
Elicitation
Argumentation
Reflection
revisiting others’ posts
# of posts per group
This may be due to
the low levels of
reflection within the
posts (floor effect)
revisiting others’ posts
% of real reads
revisiting others’ posts?
Discussion

20. Conclusions and Future Work
• Empirical evidence supports a relationship between
speaking and listening (value of depth and revisitation)
– When students take the time to read, reread peers’ posts there
are related benefits in the quality of the posts they contribute
– Lack of a breadth effect - explanation and implications?
• Suggests new ways to support students in effective
discussion participation
– Ongoing work to test the efficacy of providing students with
listening guidance to support their speaking quality
• Need to examine generalizability to listening-speaking
relationships in other kinds of discussion contexts
– Grain size issue
Conclusions

21. Thank you! Questions?
Alyssa Wise alyssa_wise@sfu.ca
Yuting Zhao yza174@sfu.ca
Educational Technology & Learning Design Program
Simon Fraser University | Vancouver, Canada