Measuring multiple-source based academic writing self-efficacy.

Although writing self-efficacy has been a productive line of research for several decades, no prior writing self-efficacy measure has focused on students' self-efficacy for integrating information across multiple sources when producing an academic text. To fill this gap in existing research on the measurement of writing motivation, we designed a measure targeting the extent to which students are confident that they can write an academic text that integrates content from several different sources. In a study with Norwegian undergraduate students (n = 136), this measure, which we called the Multiple-Source based Academic Self-Efficacy Scale (MAWSES), was validated by means of confirmatory factor analysis and relationships between the resulting unitary construct and other relevant constructs. The findings provided evidence concerning the reliability and validity of the MAWSES. In future research, this measure could be included as an independent variable to predict processes and products of multiple-source based, integrated academic writing, as a moderator or mediator of effects in writing intervention research, or as an outcome variable in its own right.

Do medium and Context Matter when learning from multiple complementary Digital texts and videos?

Students more than ever learn from online sources, such as digital texts or videos. Little research has compared processes and outcomes across these two mediums. Using a between-participants experimental design, this study investigated whether medium (texts vs. videos) and context (less authoritative vs. more authoritative), independently and in concert, affected students' engagement, integrated understanding, and calibration. The two mediums presented identical information on the topic of social media, which was distributed across two complementary texts in the text condition and across two complementary videos in the video condition. In the less authoritative context, the two information sources (texts or videos) were posted by a friend on Facebook; in the more authoritative context, the same information sources (texts or videos) were posted by a professor on Moodle. Results showed a main effect of medium on behavioral engagement in terms of processing time, as students used longer time watching the two videos than reading the two digital texts. No other main medium or context effects were statistically significant; nor were there any interaction effects of medium with context on any of the outcome variables. The findings are discussed in light of the alternative hypotheses that guided the study and the directions it suggests for future research. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11251-022-09591-8.

Adolescents' credibility justifications when evaluating online texts.

Research has shown that students differ in their abilities to evaluate the credibility of online texts, and, in general, many perform poorly on online evaluation tasks. This study extended current knowledge by examining students' abilities to justify the credibility of online texts from different perspectives, thus providing a more nuanced understanding of students' credibility evaluation ability. We examined how upper secondary school students (N = 73; aged 16 to 17) evaluated author expertise, author intention, the publication venue, and the quality of evidence when reading four texts about the effects of sugar consumption in a web-based environment. Additionally, we examined how students' prior topic knowledge, Internet-specific justification beliefs, and time on task were associated with their credibility justifications. Students evaluated author expertise, author intention, the venue, and the quality of evidence for each text on a six-point scale and provided written justifications for their evaluations. While students' credibility evaluations were quite accurate, their credibility justifications lacked sophistication. Inter-individual differences were considerable, however. Regression analysis revealed that time on task was a statistically significant unique predictor of students' credibility justifications. Instructional implications are discussed.

Students working with multiple conflicting documents on a scientific issue: relations between epistemic cognition while reading and sourcing and argumentation in essays.

BACKGROUND: There is burgeoning research within educational psychology on both epistemic cognition and multiple-documents literacy, as well as on relationships between the two constructs. AIM: To examine relationships between epistemic cognition concerning the justification of knowledge claims and sourcing and argumentation skills. SAMPLE: Participants were 51 Norwegian undergraduates. METHOD: Three dimensions of justification were identified in think-aloud protocols based on students' reading of six documents presenting conflicting claims on the controversial scientific issue of cell phone radiation and health risks: justification by authority, personal justification and justification by multiple sources. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses were performed to examine the unique predictability of these dimensions for essay performance after removing variance associated with prior knowledge about the topic of the documents. RESULTS: After controlling for topic knowledge, justification by multiple sources uniquely predicted students' sourcing and argumentation in essays that they wrote after reading the documents, with students trying to justify knowledge claims by corroborating across several sources of information more likely to include explicit source citations, link sources and contents, and display better, more integrated argumentation in their essays. CONCLUSION: Findings are considered in the light of a theoretical framework for multiple-documents literacy adapted to the domain of science, and both theoretical and educational implications are discussed.

The cognitive and linguistic foundations of early reading development: a Norwegian latent variable longitudinal study.

The authors present the results of a 2-year longitudinal study of 228 Norwegian children beginning some 12 months before formal reading instruction began. The relationships between a range of cognitive and linguistic skills (letter knowledge, phoneme manipulation, visual-verbal paired-associate learning, rapid automatized naming (RAN), short-term memory, and verbal and nonverbal ability) were investigated and related to later measures of word recognition in reading. Letter knowledge, phoneme manipulation, and RAN were independent longitudinal predictors of early reading (word recognition) skills in the regular Norwegian orthography. Early reading skills initially appeared well described as a unitary construct that then showed rapid differentiation into correlated subskills (word decoding, orthographic choice, text reading, and nonword reading) that showed very high levels of longitudinal stability. The results are related to current ideas about the cognitive foundations of early reading skills.

Examining the validity of self-reports on scales measuring students' strategic processing.

BACKGROUND: Self-report inventories trying to measure strategic processing at a global level have been much used in both basic and applied research. However, the validity of global strategy scores is open to question because such inventories assess strategy perceptions outside the context of specific task performance. AIMS: The primary aim was to examine the criterion-related and construct validity of the global strategy data obtained with the Cross-Curricular Competencies (CCC) scale. Additionally, we wanted to compare the validity of these data with the validity of data obtained with a task-specific self-report inventory focusing on the same types of strategies. SAMPLE: The sample included 269 10th-grade students from 12 different junior high schools. METHODS: Global strategy use as assessed with the CCC was compared with task-specific strategy use reported in three different reading situations. Moreover, relationships between scores on the CCC and scores on measures of text comprehension were examined and compared with relationships between scores on the task-specific strategy measure and the same comprehension measures. RESULTS: The comparison between the CCC strategy scores and the task-specific strategy scores suggested only modest criterion-related validity for the data obtained with the global strategy inventory. The CCC strategy scores were also not related to the text comprehension measures, indicating poor construct validity. In contrast, the task-specific strategy scores were positively related to the comprehension measures, indicating good construct validity. CONCLUSION: Attempts to measure strategic processing at a global level seem to have limited validity and utility.

The relationship between epistemological beliefs, implicit theories of intelligence, and self-regulated learning among Norwegian postsecondary students.

BACKGROUND: More empirical work is needed to examine the dimensionality of personal epistemology and relations between those dimensions and motivational and strategic components of self-regulated learning. In particular, there is great need to investigate personal epistemology and its relation to self-regulated learning across cultures and academic contexts. Because the demarcation between personal epistemology and implicit theories of intelligence has been questioned, dimensions of personal epistemology should also be studied in relation to implicit theories of intelligence. AIMS: The primary aim was to examine the dimensionality of personal epistemology and the relation between those dimensions and implicit theories of intelligence in the cultural context of Norwegian postsecondary education. A secondary aim was to examine the relative contribution of epistemological beliefs and theories of intelligence to motivational and strategic components of self-regulated learning in different academic contexts within that culture. SAMPLES: The first sample included 178 business administration students in a traditional transmission-oriented instructional context; the second, 108 student teachers in an innovative pedagogical context. METHODS: The dimensionality of the Schommer Epistemological Questionnaire was examined through factor analyses, and the resulting dimensions were examined in relation to implicit theories of intelligence. We performed multiple regression analyses, separately for the two academic contexts, to try to predict motivational (i.e. self-efficacy beliefs, mastery goal orientation, and interest) and strategic (i.e. self-regulatory strategy use) components of self-regulated learning with epistemological beliefs and implicit theories of intelligence. RESULTS: Considerable cross-cultural generalizability was found for the dimensionality of personal epistemology. Moreover, the dimensions of personal epistemology seemed to represent constructs separate from the construct of implicit theories of intelligence. Differences in the predictability of the epistemological dimensions were found for the two samples. For the student teachers, belief about knowledge construction and modification was a better predictor of self-regulated learning. For the business administration students, belief about the certainty of knowledge played a more important role in self-regulated learning. CONCLUSIONS: Epistemological beliefs predict self-regulated learning among Norwegian postsecondary students and play more important roles than implicit theories of intelligence. Relations between epistemological beliefs and self-regulated learning may vary with academic context.

Decoding, knowledge, and strategies in comprehension of expository text.

We examined the relative contribution of decoding, topic knowledge, and strategic processing to the comprehension of social science text in a sample of Norwegian junior high school students. Additionally, we examined the interaction of topic knowledge with strategic processing on students' text comprehension, and whether poor word-level skill could be effectively compensated for by higher-level processing involving knowledge or strategies. Multiple regression analysis indicated that students' prior knowledge about the topic of the text contributed most to their comprehension. Students' reported use of organization and monitoring strategies contributed less but still significantly to text comprehension, as did their word decoding skills. However, no interaction between topic knowledge and strategic processing was found. Analyses of variance and post-hoc comparison tests, supplemented by a descriptive analysis, suggested that the coexistence of poor decoding skill and good text comprehension may be related to much topic knowledge, good strategy use, or both.