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Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations
The Graduate School
2007
Perceived Teacher-Directedness,
Omniscient Authority, and Communication
Behaviors in Second Language Cooperative
Learning
Feng Zhou
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THE FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE OF EDUCATION
PERCEIVED TEACHER-DIRECTEDNESS, OMNISCIENT AUTHORITY,
AND COMMUNICATION BEHAVIORS
IN SECOND LANGUAGE COOPERATIVE LEARNING
By
FENG ZHOU
A Thesis submitted to the
Department of Educational Psychology and Learning Systems
in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of
Master of Art
Degree Awarded:
Spring Semester, 2007
The members of the Committee approve the Thesis of Feng Zhou defended on March 2nd, 2007. Jeanine E. Turner Professor Directing Thesis John Keller Committee Member Susan C. Losh Committee Member Approved: Gary Peterson, Chair Department of Educational Psychology and Learning Systems The Office of Graduate Studies has verified and approved the above named committee members. ii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Tables .…………………………………………………………..…………...v
List of Figures ……………………………………………………………….............vi
Abstract .......................................................................................................................vii
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………..1
Cooperative Learning and Group Autonomy…………………………………...1
Teacher Directedness…………………………………………………………....2
Omniscient Authority Beliefs…………………………………………………...3
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW……………………………………………...4
Teacher-Directedness and Group Autonomy .......................................................4
Omniscient Authority Beliefs ..............................................................................6
Individual Communication Behaviors as Indicator of Group Autonomy……...7
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODS…………………………………………….15
Research Questions.............................................................................................15
Hypotheses..........................................................................................................15
Participants......................................................................................…………....16
Procedures….......................................................................................................17
Measures………… .............................................................................................18
CHAPTER 4: RESULTS………………………………………………...…………...21
.
Preliminary Analysis………………………………………………………...…21
Initial Analysis ....................................................................................................24
Comparative Analysis by Items ..........................................................................31
CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS ………...……………….…...34
Omniscient Authority Beliefs in Different Cultural Contexts ............................34
Teacher-directedness and its Relationship to Omniscient Authority and Personal
Epistemology…………...……………………………………………………....37
Communication Behaviors as Indications of Group Autonomy and its
Relationship to Omniscient Authority and Teacher-directedness. ......................39
Limitations………… ..........................................................................................43
Implications and Future Directions………………………..………….…...…...44
iii
APPENDICES
.......................................................................................................48
Appendix A: Measurements................................................................................48
Appendix B: Approval Memorandum and Consent Letter………………….….52
REFERENCES
.......................................................................................................54
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ....................................................................................59
iv
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Demographic Descriptions……..………………………………….......……17
Table 2: Cronbach’s Alphas and Sample Items for Subscales in Pilot Study………...19
Table 3: Cronbach’s Alpha for Original Scales across Subgroup and the Whole
Sample……………..........………………………………………......…..…23
Table 4: Reliability for the Original Scales and the Final Version (Whole
Sample) ……………..........…………………..………………………..…24
Table 5: Correlations among Omniscient Authority Beliefs, Teacherdirectedness
and Communication Behaviors.....................................................................26
Table 6: Cultural Comparison: Means, Standardized Deviation for Two Cultural Groups
………………………………………………………………………...28
Table 7: ANOVA Analysis by Culture and Gender ..................................................... 30
Table 8: T-test for Subscales ........................................................................................32
v
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Relationship among Teacher-directedness, Omniscient Authority Beliefs and
Intra-group Communication Behaviors…………………………………………...….14
Figure 2: Relationship among Teacher-directedness, Omniscient Authority beliefs and
Six Dimensions of Communication Behavior………………......................................39
vi
ABSTRACT
After firstly investigating the correlations among students’ omniscient authority
beliefs,
students’ perceived
teacher-directedness,
and
students’ intra-group
communication behaviors, this research explored the cultural differences between
American students and Chinese students regarding to these variables. A total of 89
Chinese students and 131 American students participated in this research. The results
indicated that students’ naïve omniscient authority beliefs were positively correlated
with their perceptions of higher teacher-directedness and negatively correlated with
the mega-cognitive perspective of intra-group communication behavior. Meanwhile,
differences were found between Chinese and American cultural groups with regards
to students’ omniscient authority beliefs, perceived teacher-directedness, and
communication behaviors during cooperative learning. Chinese students tended to
rely on themselves as the resources of information and knowledge and Chinese
students perceived less teacher-directedness compared to American students. As to
within-group communication behaviors, Chinese students were more excelled at time
management while American students were more excelled at maintaining group
affection.
vii
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Cooperative learning is an important pedagogical practice in second language (L2)
classrooms. The use of cooperative learning in L2 education is supported by theories of
second language acquisition (SLA) such as the input hypothesis (Krashen & Terrell,
1983), the interaction hypothesis (Long, 1981; Pica, 1995), the output hypothesis (Swain,
1985), and sociocultural theory (Thorne, 2005). General education principles such as
constructivism (Driscoll, 2000), learner autonomy (Deci & Ryan, 1987) and learner
motivation in L2 (Dörnyei, 1994; Dörnyei & Malderez, 1997) also stress the benefits of
implementing cooperative learning in L2 classrooms.
However, in practice, cooperative learning may not be as effective as it could be.
This study investigated factors that may facilitate, or hinder, the formation of effective L2
cooperative learning groups. In particular, this study investigated the relationships of
teacher-directedness,
students’
communication behaviors.
omniscient
authority
beliefs,
and
within-group
The following literature review describes these constructs
and their importance to promoting group autonomy—an intra-group characteristic that
facilitates cohesive, group problem-solving.
Cooperative Learning and Group Autonomy
Unlike traditional instructional strategies, such as delivering lectures, cooperative
learning requires students to take more responsibility for their learning processes while
instructors provide assistance as needed. When teachers create effective cooperative
learning activities, students construct their learning through peer-focused, interpersonal
communications.
These
interpersonal
communications
scaffold
students’
knowledge-building while also scaffolding their individual sense of autonomy and
competence. For example, in second language class meetings, when students engage in a
group discussion or debate, they must organize useful learning materials through
exchanging ideas and decision making. These interpersonal processes involve both basic
interpersonal communication as well as group monitoring procedures such as time
management, and task allocation among group members.
1
However, not all instructors can create successful cooperative learning activities
that require students to take, and share, group responsibilities and group autonomy. When
students in cooperative groups create group autonomy, they independently (i.e., not ask
assistance from teachers) are able to take responsibility to solve learning-related conflicts
through intra-group interactions (Johnson, Johnson & Stanne, 2000). Hence, “group
members work to solve their problems unaided so that each individual learns to rely on
the members of the group to explain or to work out ambiguities together (Kulge, 1999).”
What factors affect group autonomy? The following sections describe two factors that
may affect group autonomy, 1) teacher-directedness and 2) omniscient authority beliefs.
Teacher-Directedness
One factor that could affect students’ ability to experience group autonomy is the
extent to which the teacher maintains control as opposed to giving control to students (i.e.,
teacher-directedness). Students experience learning autonomy and initiative when
teachers display a low degree of directedness (Deci & Ryan, 1985; 2000). When teachers,
who usually maintain control during instruction, place students in cooperative groups, the
students may believe it is the teachers’ responsibility to help them solve group-related
problems. If the teacher has not scaffolded students’ individual autonomy, students may
not take initiative in maintaining group processes. In this way, teachers’ authority type
(level of directedness) may directly influence students’ group autonomy.
Omniscient Authority Beliefs
Teacher directedness can also affect students’ intra-group behaviors indirectly
(Dörnyei, 1994; Dörnyei & Malderez, 1997), through shaping students’ omniscient
authority beliefs (Schommer, 1990), the belief that experts (i.e., teachers) have authority
over students’ learning. When students have omniscient authority beliefs, they expect and
rely on authorities’ information. They depend on teachers’ instructions, take little
initiative to find resources of information, and they do not believe that useful information
can be gained from peers. Students’ omniscient authority beliefs may greatly impact their
perceptions of responsibilities and duties for group work. Therefore, students’ omniscient
authority beliefs can affect the extent to which groups establish group autonomy.
2
Omniscient authority beliefs affect students’ perceptions of responsibility—what students
should do and what they value—within group activities (Nelson, 1997).
Thus, this study was designed to investigate factors that affect group autonomy,
particularly group-work within second language classrooms. Because American and
Chinese cultures have been considered as natural settings of two different authority types
(e.g., Chinese teachers are more directive versus American teachers are more supportive.),
the first step of this research was a cross-cultural comparison of teacher directedness,
omniscient authority beliefs, and group autonomy behaviors. The second step of this
research was to investigate how teachers’ directedness relates to students’ omniscient
authority beliefs and group autonomy behaviors.
The following chapters describe the theoretical and research foundations for my
study and the details of my research.
3
CHAPTER 2
LITERATURE REVIEW
Teacher-Directedness and Group Autonomy
Learner Autonomy and Group Autonomy
Compared to learner autonomy, group autonomy is a rarely used concept in
educational literature. This section will begin with a short discussion of the similarity and
differences between learner autonomy and group autonomy.
Learner autonomy, according to Deci and Ryan (1987), refers to “action that is
chosen; action for which one is responsible” (p. 1025). Extending Deci and Ryan’s (1987)
definition, Reeve, Nix, and Hamm (2003) further clarified that autonomy contains three
experiential qualities that include “an inner endorsement of one’s action (origin, personal
causation, internal locus), an experience during that action of high flexibility and low
pressure (psychological freedom), and a sense that one’s actions are truly chosen
(perceived choice)” (p 375).
Group autonomy occurs when “group members work to solve their problems
unaided so that each individual learns to rely on the members of the group to explain or
to work out ambiguities together” and group autonomy is established when “the peers
interact to do many of the things they have felt responsible for themselves” (p. 3 Jacobs,
2003). Briefly, group autonomy requires students to solve any group-related problem
such as understanding each other, maintaining healthy group process, and solving
conflicts among group members. Group autonomy occurs through students taking
responsibilities and actions themselves, not asking assistance from teachers.
The difference between learner autonomy and group autonomy is that learner
autonomy can be applied in any learning situation, while group autonomy emphasizes
individuals’ actions towards members’ responsibility for a group activity. Thus, the
definition of group autonomy depends on students’ understanding of their responsibilities
in groups and what they should do to maintain effective group processes. Meanwhile,
group autonomy still shares the three experiential qualities of individual autonomy. For
instance, students must (1) feel they have their own choice of actions within group
processes without intervening pressures from instructors (internal locus of control and
4
perceived choice) and (2) experience low pressure (psychological freedom), when (3)
they participate in chosen group learning activities. As a result, theory that applies to
learner autonomy can also apply to group autonomy.
Teacher-Directedness and Learning Autonomy
Self-determination theory (SD) presented by Deci and Ryan (1985) specified
several factors that explain variability in students’ intrinsic motivation. The theory argues
that social-contextual events, such as feedback and communication, induce feelings of
competence and enhance intrinsic motivation for that action. Second, in order to be
motivated, people must not only experience competence and efficacy, they must also
experience their behavior as being autonomous (Ryan & Deci, 2000). Students’ intrinsic
motivation requires immediate contextual supports for autonomy and competence so that
students may attribute their success to inner resources (Reeve, 1996). This kind of
attribution refers to perceived locus of causality (Reeve, Nix, & Hamm, 2003), which
reflects the individual’s perception that his or her behavior is initiated and regulated by an
internal force (internal locus of causality) instead of an environmental force (external
locus of causality).
Teachers’ authority type is closely associated with teachers’ directedness and
students’ perceived autonomy. Teachers can provide a context that support students’
autonomy and competency. A teacher with a high degree of directedness displays less
autonomy-supportive behaviors in the classroom, while a teacher with a low degree of
directedness will give students more freedom of choice to enhance their learning
autonomy. For example, a teacher with a lesser degree of directedness would allow
students to choose their own study topics within a certain content area, while a teacher
with a higher degree of directedness would decide the specific learning topics.
Consequently, students experience autonomy only when teachers display an appropriate
degree of directedness and autonomy supportive authority.
It is teachers’ responsibility to identify students’ degree of learning and to help
them progress toward self-directedness rather than to take the learning responsibility in
the classroom themselves (Lindner, Dooley & Williams, 2003). Experimental research
has shown that reduced teacher-directedness can increase students’ control and initiative
5
(e.g., Kallenbach & Viens, 2004); High degree of teacher-directedness has also been
shown to have a negative relationship to students’ knowledge-building and intentional
learning (Shell, Husman, Turner, Cliffel, Nath, & Sweany 2006).
Much research has
advocated that teachers should reduce directedness behaviors and act as classroom
facilitators rather than classroom directors (Knobloch, 2003).
In summary, because group autonomy shares similar experiential qualities as
learner autonomy, reduced teacher-directedness in the context of cooperative learning
activities may increase group autonomy as well as increase individual autonomy.
Omniscient Authority Beliefs
Personal epistemology is a person’s beliefs about the nature of knowledge
(Ravindran, 2005). According to Schommer (1994; Schommer-Aikins, 2002),
epistemological beliefs constitute a system of beliefs about the nature and acquisition of
knowledge. These beliefs have direct and indirect effects on students’ learning.
Schommer (1994) describes five dimensions of students’ belief systems that include 1)
certainty of knowledge, 2) structure of knowledge, 3) authority source of knowledge, 4)
control of knowledge, and 5) speed of knowledge.
In this study, students’ authority source of knowledge, i.e., omniscient authority
was investigated because this belief is shaped by teacher’s authority type under the
mediating variable of power distance (Nelson, 1997). As Nelson exclaimed (1997):
In educational settings, power distance refers to the distance between a teacher
and a student. In countries with a large power distance, teachers are treated
with respect and are viewed as the holders of truth, wisdom, and knowledge.
They pass this knowledge on to their students. Students perceive teachers as
the ones who know, the ones from whom they will learn. They believe that the
quality of their learning depends on their teachers’ excellence. (p 80)
Furthermore, omniscience authority beliefs may affect students’ behaviors within
group processes because students who hold this belief may not value peers’ views as they
do teachers’ views. As Nelson (1997) stressed:
Students from countries with a large power distance are much less likely to
value their peers’ views than are students from countries with a smaller power
distance.
6
It is not uncommon for English-as-a-second-language students from countries
with a large power distance to make comments such as, ‘I am not the teacher. I
cannot say what is the right way’ or ‘I want the teacher to tell me what to
do.’……In one study of an ESL peer response group, all of the ESL students
agreed that they did not feel competent to comment on each other’s papers and
that they would have liked the teacher to be part of the group ... They wanted
the teacher to tell them how to change their papers. (p 80)
Previous research has found cultural differences in students’ beliefs of omniscient
authority. For example, one study indicated that students in North America, Hong Kong,
and Taiwan showed different degrees of omniscient authority (Chan & Elloitt, 1998). The
result of this study suggested that omniscient beliefs are internalized from different
cultural contexts (Chan & Elloitt, 2002; 2004).
With respect to students’ learning, having beliefs in omniscient authority may
influence their cognitive processes. For example, students who have lower beliefs of
omniscient authority have been shown to have more successful solutions to
problem-solving in ill-defined contexts (Schraw, Dunkle, & Bendixen, 1995). High
degree of students’ omniscient authority beliefs has also been found to have an
association with students’ immature moral reasoning (Bendixen, Schraw, & Dunkle, 1998)
and poor reasoning ability (Curtis, Binlingslea, & Wilson, 1988).
Individual Communication Behaviors as Indicators of Group Autonomy
Communication Behaviors and the Nature of Small Groups
Several theories have proposed models that describe group work processes (Mill,
1967). However, the cybernetic-growth model is the most complete model that integrates
the best features of previous models (Zeuschner, 1992).
Most important for my research, this model emphasizes the primary role of
feedback in group development. The cybernetic-growth model suggests that feedback
impacts the goal orientation of the group, the structure of the group, and the personal
development of the individual sense of self within the group. Small groups are considered
as an agent for developing and responding to intrapersonal feedbacks (Zeuschner, 1992).
According to this model, a group runs well when members can work together for the
7
purpose of providing feedback to each other. The group operates most effectively when
its members can find the best working approaches through feedback exchange. For
positive group outcomes, the group can traverse difficulties through recognizing the
benefits of conflict and promoting group growth through negotiations.
Intra-group Communication and Group Autonomy
Due to the nature of small groups, this study will focus on individuals’
perception of group communication behaviors. Group communication behaviors can be
broadly defined as “any verbal or nonverbal behavior that is perceived by other group
members” (p. 137, Johnson & Johnson, 2002). A more common definition is “a message
sent by one group member to one or more receivers with the conscious intent of affecting
the receivers’ behavior” (p. 138, Johnson & Johnson, 2002). In the cybernetic–growth
model, small groups are information-processing systems that can increase their
capabilities by sending and responding to intrapersonal feedbacks (Mill, 1967). Therefore,
a group’s function, management, and maintenance are realized through the transaction of
communication behaviors among group members.
Within-group communication behaviors can be seen as indicators of group
autonomy. Communication behaviors displayed during cooperative learning reflect
students’ understanding of their responsibilities in group tasks. As mentioned previously,
group autonomy emphasizes individual actions that represent members’ feelings of
responsibility for group activities. Thus, group autonomy depends on students’
understanding of their responsibilities within the group and what they should do to
maintain healthy group processes. For instance, a student who thinks he is responsible for
enhancing understanding among group members will clarify ideas for himself and others
when he perceives that group members do not understand each other. He chooses to do so
from an intrinsic sense of responsibility to the group, without the intervention of
instructors. His choice enables the group activities to continue effectively. In summary,
individual communication behaviors can be seen as indicators of group focused
autonomy. Group members need to display all kinds of communication behaviors to solve
problems encountered during the learning process, so as to achieve group autonomy. The
8
next section will discuss the functions of communications behaviors from three
perspectives.
Multiple Functions of Communication and Feedback
How can communication and feedback behaviors influence the quality of
cooperative learning experiences? This question can be answered by investigating the
functions that group communication and feedback behaviors perform: the linguistic
function (Pica, 1983), the social-cultural function (Nelson, 1997), and psychological
function (Johnson & Johnson, 1989; Johnson & Johnson, 1998).
Linguistic Perspective of Communication and Feedback Behaviors
In Pica’s (1983) model of negotiated modification of conversational interaction,
all types of feedback serves as bridges that connect information inputs and outputs. This
model (Pica, 1983) proposes that during communicative exchanges in which addressees
have difficulty understanding and addressors sense this difficulty, addressors restructure
the conversation so as to make their communication comprehensible to addressees, thus,
allowing the conversation to continue. In the restructuring, addressors could, for example,
pause and question addressees to discover the extent to which the addressee understood,
or they could simply repeat themselves verbatim, or they could paraphrase than recast.
These same restructuring techniques could be used in the subsequent utterances of the
addressees. Such modifications would give the interlocutors more opportunities to
negotiate meaning by (1) providing additional information and (2) allowing addressees
more time to process message content. Therefore, the linguistic function of feedback
enhances comprehension among group members.
Social-Cultural Perspective of Communication and Feedback Behaviors
According to the cultural model addressed by Hofstede (1984) and Nelson (1997),
the social cultural function of communication and feedback behaviors derive from four
cultural dimensions: (1) individualism and collectivism, (2) power distance, (3) the
concept of “face” and (4) communication styles.
Individualism and collectivism. Individualism, as is often seen in countries such
as the United States, is characterized by people pursue individual achievement and thus
9
subordinate the goals of the collective to personal goals. In individualistic cultures,
groups are still important to group members although membership in groups tends to
depend more on personal choice, convenience, and specialization rather than on a
commitment to maintain actively the relationships that constitute the group. On the other
hand, in collectivistic cultures, individuals tend to place the needs of the group above
their personal needs. In this scenario, the primary goal of the group is to maintain the
relationships that constitute the group, to maintain cohesion and harmony among the
group members. As a result, when interacting with members of their group, students from
collectivistic cultures will generally work toward maintaining group harmony by not
providing negative feedbacks.
Power distance. Power distance is defined as interpersonal power or influence
between two persons (Hoftetede, 1984). In educational settings, power distance usually
refers to the power between a teacher and a student (Nelson, 1997). Teachers have more
power over the student than the student has over the teacher. In group interactions, power
distance refers to the interpersonal power distance between group members. There is an
assumption underlying cooperative learning that power distance among students is equal.
With power distance being equal, students value the comments of their peers and they
believe their fellow students can help them improve their learning. Nelson (1997) stresses
that students from countries where a large power distance is maintained between teachers
and students, students are much less likely to value their peers’ views than are students
from countries where a smaller power distance is maintained between teachers and
students. Therefore, students who come from countries with a large power distance
between teachers and students may less likely to provide comments to others in group
work because they believe their comments are not valued.
Face saving. The concept of “face” refers to a set of personal claims that
constitutes one’s identity and generates a personal sense of integrity, dignity, and
self-respect (Hu & Grove, 1991). It is associated with all cultures to varying degrees, but
has greater social significance in collectivistic cultures. In a study conducted by Nelson
and Carson (1995), they found that Asian students often did not want to embarrass their
peers during cooperative learning, and hence, provided only encouragement. Therefore,
as far as the concept of “saving face” is concerned, the function of interpersonal
10
communication behaviors is focused on maintaining group harmony. When students’
group work focuses on individual “face saving”, they may be less likely to engage in
debates, provide critical feedback, or struggle with developing group understanding.
Therefore, the benefits of group work would be diminished.
Communication style. Communication style refers to the way individuals talk. The
best documented communication style is the dimension of indirect versus direct (Nelson,
1997). This dimension focuses on the degree to which speakers directly reveal their
meanings and intentions (Kitao & Kitao, 2003). In cultures that are direct, speakers are
clear about their meaning; in cultures that are indirect, speakers hint at their real meaning
and listeners are expected to make inferences from the information given. Generally,
Americans tend to have a more direct communication style than Asian culture groups. For
example, Americans value getting “straight to the point” and tend to be suspicious of
people who keep silent in groups (Nelson, 1997). Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans have a
more indirect communication style than Americans. During their cooperative learning,
Asian students are more likely to use indirect communication and feedback to express
their point of views.
Psychological Perspective of Communication and Feedback Behaviors
Literature that focuses on the psychological perspective of communication
investigates the influence of communication and feedback behaviors on (1) individual
cognitive processes among group members, (2) group judgments and making-decision,
and (3) group process interactions among group members.
Communication and feedback behaviors can change individual cognitive processes. A
series of studies conducted by Jeong (2003, 2004, 2005) showed that group
communication styles and feedback functions influence individual responses and critical
discussion (Jeong, 2004), quality of collaborative argumentation (Jeong & Joung, 2005),
and levels of critical thinking (Jeong, 2003) in on-line cooperative learning situations.
Additionally, communication and feedback behaviors influence group judgments and
decision-making. Lack of communication and proper feedback may lead to ineffective
group processes or team errors such as pilot/co-pilot, drop guard, groupthink and risky
shift. Pilot/co-pilot refers to a situation in which an individual does not feel it is his/her
11
place to challenge the actions of the group leader. In this scenario, an individual will
follow the leader and hold back his/her own actions. Drop guards occurs when a group
member trusts his partner to do the job correctly and therefore lowers his/her own guard.
Consequently, each member does not check each other’s work and thus miss the errors
that the team has made. Groupthink is a type of thought exhibited by group members who
try to minimize conflict and reach consensus without critically testing, analyzing, and
evaluating ideas. Groupthink may cause groups to make hasty, irrational decisions, where
individual doubts are set aside, for fear of upsetting the group’s balance (http://en.
wikipedia.org/wiki/Groupthink). Risky shift is a tendency for groups to gamble with group
decisions more than they would as individuals making decisions on their own. All these
team errors can be ceased through sufficient communication and questioning other
members’ actions as well as their own (http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications
/PDF /TE_1479_web.pdf).
Furthermore, according to social interdependence theory (Johnson & Johnson, 1998),
“promotive interaction occurs as individuals encourage and facilitate each other’s efforts
to reach the group goals”(www.co-operation.org/pages/SIT.html). Group members
enhance each other’s learning and group work through several communicative interaction
patterns (Johnson & Johnson, 1989). These patterns include giving and receiving help
and assistance, exchanging resources and information, giving and receiving feedback on
task and group members’ behaviors, changeling each other’s reasoning, advocating
increased efforts to achieve, mutually influencing each other’s reasoning and behavior,
engaging in interpersonal and small group skills needed for effective teamwork, and
processing how effectively group members are working together and how the group
effectiveness can be continuously improved. Different interaction patterns have different
functions. For example, supportive feedbacks such as “You are doing a good job!”, or
“We are fine, we just need another try,” can promote group motivation and affection
(Vansteenkiste, Simons, Lens, Soenens, & Matos, 2005). Other interaction patterns such
as disagreements and arguments can deepen the degree of students’ critical thinking
(Jeong, 2003).
12
Behavior in Real Life: A Trade-Off Among Three Perspectives
Overall, communication and feedback behaviors have multiple functions from
linguistic, social-cultural, and psychological perspectives. The choice of communication
behavior in real life settings is a trade-off among these three perspectives since the
multiple functions of communication behaviors are nested together rather than working
independently in a specific situation, especially in cross-cultural groups.
For example, in a group of four students who come from two countries, students are
required to finish a group quiz within 30 minutes that counts for 25% of their final grades.
This task firstly needs students to provide enough critical arguments on others’ comments
so as to reduce the errors in judgments, and promote critical thinking (Jeong, 2003). At
the same time, students have to promote students’ “face saving” according to different
cultural standards. This requires them to know others’ cultures and insert negative
feedback as less as possible. Additionally, during the whole learning procedure, students
have to use all kinds of feedback to make sure their utterances are understandable.
Therefore, in this situation, students have to take all these three perspectives into
consideration so as to modify their communication behaviors to maximize the benefits of
the whole group during the specific context.
In summary, in this section, I have stressed that both omniscient authority and
students’ perceived teacher-directedness have influence on group autonomy. Additionally,
communication behaviors are indicators of group autonomy through their linguistic,
social-cultural and psychological functions. According to the literature review, the
relationships among variables are illustrated in Figure 1:
Teacher-directedness
omniscient authority belief
Intra-group communication behaviors
Figure 1. Relationship among Teacher-directedness, Omniscient Authority Beliefs
and Intra-group Communication Behaviors
13
Accordingly, two overarching research questions were generated for further study:
(1) Is there a relationship among students’ perceptions of teacher-directedness, students’
omniscient authority beliefs, and students’ intra-group communication behaviors? and (2)
Because Chinese instructors and American instructors are natural sources of different
authority
types,
are
there
cultural
differences
of
students’ perceptions
of
teacher-directedness, students’ omniscient authority beliefs, and communication
behaviors between American and Chinese undergraduate second language majors?
With respect to the first research question, “Is there a relationship among
teacher-directedness, students’ perception of omniscient authority belief, and students’
intra-group communication behaviors,” two hypotheses were proposed:
H1. Students’ degree of perceived teacher-directedness will be positively
correlated with the degree of students’ perceived omniscient authority beliefs.
H2. Students’ communication behaviors will be correlated with the degree of
perceived teacher-directedness and omniscient authority beliefs.
With respect to the second research question, “Are there cultural differences of
students’ perceptions of teacher-directedness, students’ omniscient authority beliefs, and
communication behaviors between American and Chinese undergraduate second
language majors,” three specific hypotheses were proposed:
H3. The degree of omniscient authority among Chinese students and American
students will be significantly different. Chinese students will show a higher degree of
omniscient authority than American students;
H4. The degree of perceived teacher-directness among Chinese students and
American students will be significantly different. Chinese students will perceive a higher
degree of teacher-directness than American students;
H5. The communication behaviors employed by American and Chinese student
will be different. This aspect of the study is exploratory, so no predictions are made
regarding outcomes.
In the next section, I describe the research methods that were used to answer these
two overarching research questions.
14
CHAPTER 3
RESEARCH METHOD
Research Questions
This study investigated two major research questions:
Q1: Is there a relationship among teacher-directedness, students’ perception of
omniscient authority belief, and students’ intra-group communication behaviors?
Q2: Are there cultural differences of teacher-directedness, students’ perception of
omniscient authority, and communication behaviors between American and Chinese
undergraduate second language majors?
To answer these research questions, five specific hypotheses were generated and
tested.
Hypotheses
With respect to the first research question, “Is there a relationship among
teacher-directedness, students’ perception of omniscient authority belief, and students’
intra-group communication behaviors,” two hypotheses were proposed:
H1. Students’ degree of perceived teacher-directedness will be positively
correlated with the degree of students’ perceived omniscient authority beliefs.
H2. Students’ communication behaviors will be correlated with the degree of
perceived teacher-directedness and omniscient authority beliefs.
With respect to the second research question, “Are there cultural differences of
students’ perceptions of teacher-directedness, students’ omniscient authority beliefs, and
communication behaviors between American and Chinese undergraduate second
language majors,” three specific hypotheses were proposed:
H3. The degree of omniscient authority among Chinese students and American
students will be significantly different. Chinese students will show a higher degree of
omniscient authority than American students;
H4. The degree of perceived teacher-directness among Chinese students and
American students will be significantly different. Chinese students will perceive a higher
degree of teacher-directness than American students;
15
H5. The communication behaviors employed by American and Chinese student
will be different. This aspect of the study was exploratory, so no predictions were made
regarding outcomes.
Participants
This research was conducted among sophomore and junior Spanish major students
attending Florida State University, and sophomore and junior English major students
attending Jianghan University. These groups of participants shared some common
characteristics. First, they were similar in age (ranging from 18 to 22 years) and they had
advanced to sophomore and junior levels in college. Second, studying the English
language was the primary foreign language for Chinese students and studying Spanish
was the primary foreign language for American students. Third, both groups of students
had obtained basic foreign language skills for group communication (see
Table 1).
Chinese participants: Ninety-two Chinese subjects were recruited from the foreign
language department, Jianghan University. These Chinese students voluntarily
participated from 10 different classes directed by Chinese instructors in the spring
semester, 2006. After deletion of extreme outliers and list-wise procedure, 89 students
were considered as valid the Chinese sample. Most of the students who responded were
female students (82%), and between 19 and 23 (96%). All of the Chinese participants
were undergraduate students enrolled in the classes of new English (7%), oral English
(18%), reading comprehension (6%), intensive English (1%), extensive English (4%),
translation (21%), English literature (18%), advanced English (17%), business English
(1%) and lexical study (7%).
American participants: American subjects (n=135) were recruited from the Spanish
language department at Florida State University. These American students were attending
elementary and intermediate Spanish courses instructed by American instructors in the
fall semester, 2006. After deletion of extreme outliers and list-wise procedure, 131
students were considered as valid American sample. Most of the students who responded
were female students (70%), white (82%) and between 17 and 24 (99%).
16
Table 1
Demographic Descriptions
Number and Percentage of Valid Participants
Chinese Sample
American Sample
(n=89)
(n= 131)
________________________________________________________________________
Gender
Female
74
82%
91
70%
Male
15
18%
40
30%
________________________________________________________________________
Ethnicity Han
89
100%
White
106
82%
Black
11
9%
Hispanic 10
8%
Asian
2%
3
________________________________________________________________________
* Percentages may not equal 100% due to rounding.
Procedures
Both Chinese students and American students completed the survey package in
their foreign language classes. For the Chinese students, the survey packages were mailed
to China. Chinese students completed the survey package under the supervision of their
instructors during the class meeting in summer 2006. Before the data collection, the
Chinese instructors were informed that they were not to help students with understanding
the survey items; however, Chinese students were allowed to use a Chinese-English
dictionary while completing the survey. For the American students, the survey packages
were delivered during class meetings under the supervision of the researcher, in fall 2006.
17
Measures
The survey package consisted of survey instruments that were used to assess
foreign language learners’ degree of omniscient authority, perceived teacher-directedness,
and students’ communication behaviors (see Appendix A). The first page of the package
was designed to gather background information about the students: age, gender,
race/ethnicity, and university; the second part of the questionnaire package consisted of
three surveys containing omniscient authority, perceived teacher-directedness and
students’ communication behaviors.
To determine initial reliability and validity of the items, a pilot study was
conducted to test these three subscales. Forty students enrolled in a course of classroom
assessments in the spring, 2006, participated in the pilot study. They completed the
survey package and provided feedback both on the content and the wording of the survey.
Based on students’ feedback, revisions were made to some items. For example,
student-comments indicated that one item in the communication behavior survey, “I will
give my opinions even if the majority of the group members hold different ideas,”
prompted different interpretations. This statement can be interpreted either as “when the
majority of the group members hold several different ideas” or “when the majority of the
group members hold a different idea.” Therefore, this item was revised to read: “I will
give my opinions even if the majority of the group members hold a different opinion.”
Some other items were added into or deleted from the original scales to establish higher
inter-item consistency (i.e., higher Cronbach alpha coefficients). Generally speaking,
students indicated the items were understandable.
Omniscient authority beliefs. The omniscient authority subscale evaluated
students’ beliefs about the source of knowledge, including items about knowledge as
determined and distributed by authorities and experts. The original omniscient authority
survey consisted of 7 items and was adapted from the omniscient authority subscale of
Schommer’s (1990) epistemology beliefs framework. Combined with the omniscient
authority subscale used in Chan and Elliott’s (2004) research and the feedback from the
pilot study, the final version of this scale consisted of 10 Likert-type items that will be
rated on a 7-point scale with responses ranging from 1 (strong disagree) to 7 (strong
agree).
18
Teacher-directedness. The teacher-directedness subscale evaluated students’
perception about instructors’ authority type and autonomy supportive behaviors in the
classroom. The teacher-directedness survey consisted of 7 items and was adapted from
the teacher-directedness survey from Shell, Husman, Cliffel, Nath, Sweany, and Turner’s
work (1997). The survey consisted of 8 Likert-type items that would be rated on a 7-point
scale with responses ranging from 1 (strong disagree) to 7 (strong agree).
Table 2
Cronbach’s Alphas, and Sample Items for Subscales in Pilot Study
A. Omniscient authority (7 items, alpha=.30)
I can rely in an expert (e.g., professor, teacher) in learning about something I really
want to know.
I believe how much a person gets out of school mostly depends on the quality of the
professor (teacher).
B. Perceived teacher-directedness (7 items, alpha=.83)
In this class, I spend most of time listening to the instructor.
In this class, the instructor focuses on getting us to learn the right answer to
questions.
C. Communication behavior (36 items)
a.
Correcting error behaviors (6 items, alpha=.49)
When I think someone makes a mistake, I just simply tell him/her that he/she is
wrong.
b. Expressing ideas (6 items, alpha=.65)
I will give my opinions even if the majority of the group members hold a
different idea.
c.
Clarifying confusion (6 items, alpha=.59)
When I feel confused, I usually keep quite.
d.
Clarifying confusing for other (5 items, alpha=.54)
When I am required to clarify my ideas, I provide more details to make myself
understood.
e. Timing management (7 items, alpha=.32)
When someone begins to say something unrelated to the group’s work, I will
remind him/her to come back to the topic.
f.
Positive feedback (6 items, alpha=.84)
I give verbal praise when I think other members do a good job.
19
Communication behaviors. Because no scale exists for assessing all the functions of
communication behaviors posited in this study, a communication behaviors scale was
designed to measure students’ intragroup communication behaviors. This original scale
contained 36 Likert-type items in six dimensions: (1) correcting error behaviors, (2)
expressing ideas, (3) clarifying confusion, (4) clarifying confusing for others, (5) timing
management, and (6) positive feedback.
The six dimensions of communication behaviors were designed to be aligned with
the linguistic function (Pica, 1993), the social cultural function (Nelson, 1997), and
psychological function of communication behaviors (Johnson & Johnson, 1989; Johnson
& Johnson, 1998). Combined with the feedback from students’ responses in the pilot
study, 35 items were kept to form the final version. The titles, Cronbach’s alphas and
sample items for subscales used in the pilot study are displayed in Table 2.
20
CHAPTER 4
RESULTS
The results are organized into three major sections: (1) preliminary analysis, (2)
correlational analysis among variables and comparative analysis of cultural differences,
and (3) descriptive analysis of specific items. The first section describes the process of
preliminary analysis. It describes the process of identifying outliers, it reports the
reliability tests in each sub-group (Chinese and American) and with the combined sample,
and finally it explains the standards for determining items that were kept in subscales for
analysis. The second section details the initial data analysis through: (1) correlational
analysis of the relationship among subscales; and (2) comparative analysis of Chinese
and American students’ ratings for omniscient authority beliefs, their perceived degree of
teacher-directedness, and communication behaviors. Finally, because reliability tests
showed that two subscales (“correcting errors” and “clarifying own confusions”) did not
have high internal cohesion (Cronbach’s alpha <.60), additional analysis were conducted.
Therefore, the third section contains a comparative analysis of specific items for cultural
differences, which serves as a complementary explanation to the research questions.
Preliminary Analysis
Identification of Extreme Outliers
Students responded to three scales in their survey packet. Before the reliability
tests were conducted, a descriptive analysis was conducted to identify possible outliers.
In general, data in all the 8 subscales were normally distributed. To identify extreme
outliers in this study, the following two standards were used: (1) The observation was
extremely far from the mean of normal distribution, i.e., standard deviation was greater
than 5; and (2) among the total of 8 subscales, an individual’s data was identified as
having extreme outliers (standard deviation was greater than 5) in at least two subscales.
21
According to these standards, 2 Chinese participants and 4 American participants were
indicated as having extreme outliers by SPSS (Statistics Package for Social Science)
program, and were deleted from the sample for analysis.
Inter-item Cohesion of Subscales
First, I discuss the inter-item cohesion of each subscale across the two cultural
groups as well as the inter-item cohesion of the combined samples of all Chinese and
American participants. Second, I discuss the standards for keeping or removing items for
higher inter-item cohesion.
Coefficient alphas for the three scales respectively for the Chinese sample, the
American sample and the whole sample were as follows: (1) Omniscient authority belief
(10 items), .58, .62. 64; (2) Teacher-directedness (8 items), .68, .70, .68; (3)
Communication behaviors, a) Correcting errors, .47, .57, .47; b) Expressing ideas (6
items), .56, .54, .55; c) Clarifying own confusion (5 items), .41, .31, .31; d) Clarifying
confusion for others (5 items), .64, .65, .64; e) Timing management (7
items), .70, .69, .70; and f) Positive feedback (6 items), .65, .70, .65.
Except for the “correcting error” and “clarifying own confusion” subscales, the
Chinese sample and the American sample showed similar Cronbach’s alphas. Upon
further investigating, a violation of reliability models assumptions was detected in the
“Clarifying own confusion” subscale in the Chinese sample and in the whole sample. The
violation indicated that there was a negative covariance among items, and there were two
items in the “Clarifying own confusion” subscale were negatively correlated with the rest
items within the scale.
The highest coefficient alphas for the final version of three scales, using the
combined sample were as follows: (1) Omniscient authority belief (8 items), .67; (2)
Teacher-directedness (7 items), .77; (3) Communication behaviors: (a) Correcting
errors, .51; (b) Expressing ideas (4 items), .72; (c) Clarifying own confusion (3
items), .55; (d) Clarifying confusion for others (5 items), .64; (e) Timing management (6
22
items), .73; and (f) Positive feedback (5 items), .67. No violations of reliability model
assumptions were detected in the final version of scales (see Table 4 for alphas of original
and final versions). Still some items in the “clarifying own confusion” subscale did not
seem to apply well to the Chinese sample.
Table 3
Cronbach’s Alpha for Original Scales
Across Subgroups and the Whole Sample
Chinese Sample American Sample Whole Sample
(n=89)
(n=131)
(n=220)
_________________________________________________________________________________
Omniscient authority (10 items)
.58
.62
.64
Perceived teacher-directedness (8 items)
.68
.70
.68
a. Correcting error behaviors (6 items)
.47
.57
.47
b. Expressing ideas (6 items)
.56
.54
.55
c. Clarifying own confusion (5 items)
.31*
.41
.31*
Communication behavior (35 items)
d.
Clarifying confusing for other (5items) .64
.65
.64
e.
Timing Management (7 items)
.70
.69
.70
f. Positive feedback (6 items)
.65
.71
.65
___________________________________________________________________
* Reliability tests violated the reliability model assumptions.
23
Table 4
Reliability for the Original Scales and the Final Version (Whole Sample)
Original Scales
Final Version of Scales
________________________________________________________________________
Omniscient authority
.64 (10 items)
.67 (8 items) **
Perceived teacher-directedness
.68 (8 items)
.77 (7 items) **
Communication behavior (total items=27)
a. Correcting error behaviors
.47 (6 items)
.51 (4 items)
b. Expressing ideas
.55 (6 items)
.72 (4 item) *
c. Clarifying own confusion
.31* (5 items)
.55 (3 items)
d. Clarifying confusing for other
.64 (5 items)
.64 (5 items) **
e. Timing Management
.70 (7 items)
.73 (6 items) **
f. Positive feedback
.65(6 items)
.67 (5 items) **
_______________________________________________________________________
*These reliability tests violated the reliability model assumptions.
** These value indicated all the subscales whose reliabilities are larger than .60.
Initial Analyses
Descriptive Analysis of Students’ Survey Responses
First, before describing the analysis to answer the research questions, I describe
the means and standard deviations of students’ responses for omniscient authority beliefs,
perceived teacher-directedness, and communication behaviors within cultural groups
(Chinese and American) and across cultural groups.
Omniscient authority beliefs. A subscale score for each participant was obtained
by summing the each participant’s ratings for the 8 items of the subscale. The possible
score for this scale ranged from 8 to 56, with low scores representing students’ beliefs
that knowledge mainly comes from their own learning experience and high scores
representing students’ beliefs that knowledge comes from authoritative others such as
24
teachers or professors. For the Chinese sample, students’ overall omniscient authority
belief scores ranged from 14 to 41, with a mean of 28.13 (SD=6.07); for the American
sample, students’ overall omniscient authority belief scores ranged from 17 to 50, with a
mean of 34.92 (SD=5.66).
Teacher-directedness. The original version of the teacher-directedness subscale
consisted of 8 items based on the research of Shell, Husman, Cliffel, Nath, Sweany, and
Turner (1997). A subscale score for each participant was obtained by summing each
participant’s ratings of the subscale. The possible score for this scale ranged from 7 to 49,
with low scores representing more supportive instructional behaviors exhibited by
instructors and high scores representing more directive instructional behaviors perceived
by students in class. For the Chinese sample, students’ overall teacher-directedness scores
ranged from 14 to 42, with a mean of 29.09 (SD=5.74); for the American sample,
students’ overall teacher directedness scores ranged from 20 to 42, with a mean of 32.53
(SD=5.24).
Communication
behaviors.
The
participants’ scores
for
each
of
six
communication dimensions was obtained by summing participants’ ratings for the items
of each subscale. The possible score for each subscale depended on the number of items
within that subscale. The possible scores for each subscale were:
1) “Correcting error”
(4 to 28), 2) “Expressing ideas” (4 to 28), 3) “Clarifying own confusion” (3 to 21), 4)
“Clarifying confusion for others” (5 to 35), 5) “Timing management” (6 to 24) and 6)
“Positive feedback” (5 to 35). Lower scores represented lower communication skills and
higher scores represented higher communication skills.
Correlational Analysis
After calculating descriptions of items and subscales, the next step was to
examine relationships among students’ ratings in the subscales of omniscient authority
beliefs, perceived teacher-directedness, and communication behaviors.
Correlational analysis of students’ ratings on the subscales of omniscient authority
25
beliefs, students’ perception of teacher-directedness and students’ group communication
behaviors revealed interesting relationships (see Table 6). Supporting the first hypothesis,
there was a moderate and significantly positive relationship between students’ ratings of
“omniscient authority beliefs” and “teacher-directedness” (r =.25, p<.01). Looking at
relationships among students’ rating of
“omniscient authority beliefs” and six
communication behaviors, only the “timing management” subscale was correlated with
“omniscient authority beliefs”, and the correlation was negative (r = -.19, p<.01).
Table 5
Correlation of Omniscient Authority Beliefs, Teacher-directedness,
and Six Dimensions of Communication Behavior
1
1. Omniscient authority
2
3
4
5
6
7
—
2. Perceived teacher-directedness
.25**
—
3. Correcting error behaviors
.03
.29**
—
4. Expressing ideas
-.12
.17*
.56**
—
5. Clarifying own confusion
-.04
.14*
.36*
.49**
—
6. Clarifying confusing for other
-.02
.25**
.54**
.32**
.15**
7. Timing Management
-.19**
-.04
.28**
.11
-.02
.28**
—
8. Positive feedback
.11
.32**
.52**
.41**
.28*
.53**
.15*
—
*Correlation is significant at the .05 level (2-tailed).
** Correlation is significant at the .01 level (2-tailed).
Also supporting hypothesis one, correlational analysis showed that students’
ratings on perceived “teacher-directedness” was positively correlated with their ratings on
the communication behaviors of “correcting errors” (r = .29, p<.01), “clarifying
confusion for others” (r =.25, p<.01) and “providing positive feedback” (r =.32, p<.01).
With respect to the second hypothesis, the strongest correlations were
26
demonstrated among the different dimensions of communication behaviors. “Correcting
errors” was highly correlated with “expressing ideas” (r = .56, p<.01), “clarifying
confusion for others” (r =.54, p<.01), and “positive feedback” (r = .52, p<.01). “Timing
management” was only moderately related to “correcting errors” (r=.28, p<.01), and
“clarifying confusion for others” (r =.28, p<.01).
Cultural Comparison Analysis
Significant cultural differences were found in omniscient authority beliefs,
perceived teacher-directedness, timing management and positive feedback subscales.
American students showed a higher mean score for omniscient authority beliefs (Mean
difference =6.79, p<.001), which indicated Chinese students held more sophisticated
beliefs about the resources of knowledge than American students. At the same time,
American students perceived a higher degree of teacher-directedness in the classroom
(Mean difference = 3.44, p<.001), which indicated that Chinese students thought their
instructors displayed more supportive instructional behaviors than American students
perceived of their instructors.
The analysis of students’ ratings of communication behaviors showed significant
differences for the “timing management” and “positive feedback” dimensions. For the
“timing management”, the mean score for Chinese students was statistically higher than
that for American students (mean difference=3.91, p<.001), which indicated that Chinese
students were more active at controlling topic-relative communications. However, for
“positive feedback”, the mean score for American students was statistically higher than
that for Chinese students (Mean difference = 1.14, p<.05), which suggested that
American students were more skillful at managing a group’s affective environment by
encouraging each other (see Table 6).
27
Table 6
Cultural Comparison: Means, Standard Deviation for Two Cultural Groups
Means
SD
Omniscient authority*
Chinese Students
American Students
28.13
34.92
6.07
5.66
Perceived teacher-directedness*
Chinese Students
American Students
29.09
32.53
5.74
5.24
Communication behavior
a. Correcting error behaviors
Chinese Students
American Students
19.52
20.18
3.54
3.14
b. Expressing ideas
Chinese Students
American Students
20.90
20.88
4.11
4.06
c. Clarifying own confusion
Chinese Students
American Students
13.15
13.72
3.80
3.54
d. Clarifying confusing for other
Chinese Students
American Students
25.28
25.37
4.15
4.11
e. Time Management*
Chinese Students
American Students
20.88
16.96
5.01
5.45
f. Positive feedback**
Chinese Students
American Students
26.31
7.45
4.11
3.77
28
Two way ANOVAs were conducted as a further investigation of omniscient
authority beliefs, teacher-directedness and communication behaviors, across cultures and
of gender groups. Analysis revealed interesting group differences for these gender and
cultural groups. In general, for both cultural groups, the mean scores of omniscient
authority for female students were statistically higher than those for male students[F (1,
218) = 4.746, p < .05]. However, the mean scores of omniscient authority for American
students were higher than their Chinese counterparts [F (1, 218) = 47.389, p < .001]. No
statistically significant interaction by gender and culture was found.
Both female and male students perceived a similar degree of teacher-directedness in
the Chinese sample, while American male students perceived a higher degree of
teacher-directedness than American females. However, a statistically significant
difference was found across cultural groups [F (1, 218) = 19.071, p < .001] for students’
ratings of teacher-directedness.
With respect to communication behaviors, results showed significant differences for
“timing management” between both gender groups [F (1, 218) = 5.497, p < .05] and
cultural groups [F (1, 218) = 13.679, p < .001] respectively, as well as a significant
group-by-culture interaction [F (1, 218) = 5.506, p < .05]. Students’ ratings for “positive
feedback” showed a significant difference across cultures [F (1, 218) = 7.465, p < .05].
Table 6 displays the means scores, F-values, and comparison results categorized by
culture and gender.
29
Table 7:
ANOVA Analysis by Culture and Gender
Male
Females
F-value
by gender
F-value
by culture
4.746*
47.389**
F-value
interaction
Omniscient Authority
Chinese Students
American Students
28.40
35.70
28.40
32.95
Perceived teacher-directedness
Chinese Students
American Students
29.12
31.76
28.93
34.23
1.587
9.071**
2.144
Communication behavior
Correcting error
Chinese Students
American Students
19.53
19.96
19.50
20.69
.406
2.119
.470
Expressing ideas
Chinese Students
American Students
20.77
21.01
21.50
20.62
.060
.216
.671
Clarifying own confusion
Chinese Students
American Students
13.03
14.16
13.75
12.72
.342
.006
3.123
Clarifying confusing for others
Chinese Students
American Students
25.36
24.95
24.94
26.38
.545
.561
1.805
Time Management
Chinese Students
American Students
20.88
15.70
20.88
19.72
5.497*
.679**
5.506*
Positive feedback
Chinese Students
American Students
26.69
27.48
24.56
27.36
2.957
7.465*
2.340
30
.448
Table 7: Continued
* p < .05, ** p < .001;
For the second research question: “Are there cultural differences of perceived
teacher-directedness, students’ beliefs of omniscient authority, and communication
behaviors between American and Chinese undergraduate second language majors?” the
third and the forth hypotheses were rejected. Contrary to the hypothesis, American
students scored higher on two subscales, suggesting that American students tended to
believe that knowledge comes from authoritative others while Chinese students tended to
believe that knowledge comes from their own learning experience. Additionally, students
perceived American instructors to display more directive behaviors during classroom
instruction than Chinese students perceived of Chinese instructors.
As to the communication behaviors in the fifth hypothesis, American students
differed from Chinese students only on their ratings for “timing management” and
“positive feedback”. Chinese students were more likely to control group communications
so as to ensure that group discussions were closely related to the topic. On the other hand,
American students were more skillful at creating a positive affective group atmosphere,
indicating they were more likely to encourage each other during group processes.
Comparative Analysis by Items
Item by Item T-tests for “Correcting Errors” and “Clarifying Own Confusion” Subscales
As mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, item by item t-test for “correcting
errors” and “clarifying own confusion” subscales were conducted to examine the possible
reasons for the low reliabilities (Cronbach’s alpha <.60). Table 7 displays the results.
31
Table 8
T-tests: Correcting Errors and Clarifying
Items
Mean Differences*
p-value
1. When I think someone makes a mistake, I offer another
option for group members to consider.
-.01
.97
2. When I think someone makes a mistake, I will tell
him/her the correct answer directly.
-.57
<.01
3. When I think someone makes a mistake, I will explain
why the answer is wrong.
-.02
.93
4. When I think someone makes a mistake, I will check to
see if I have fully understood his/her meaning.
-.07
.67
1. When I feel confused in group work, I usually keep quiet.
-.16
.52
2. When I feel confused, I ask others to clarify their ideas
only if I am familiar with the group members.
.14
.57
3. When I fee confused, I ask other group members to help
me understand even if I am not familiar with the group
members.
-.63
<.01
Correcting error behaviors (4 items)
Clarifying own confusion (3 items)
* This value was calculated by the mean score for Chinese sample minus that for American sample
The results from t-tests indicated that, in each subscale, the two cultural groups only
had significant differences for one item. As to these two subscales, a possible reason for
the low inter-item correlations could be the small number of items. For example, in the
“correcting error” subscale, all items showed a similar pattern in that, for Chinese
students, all items-ratings were lower than those for American students. However, only
one item indicated a significant difference. Perhaps more items might increase the final
reliability to a desirable level.
As to the “clarifying own confusion” subscale, a violation of the model
32
assumption was detected in the reliability test. The violation indicated that there was a
negative covariance among items. Additionally, there were two items in the “Clarifying
own confusion” subscales that were negatively correlated with the rest items within the
scale. Another possible reason for the low reliability might be that there was more than
one factor in this subscale. For example, the first item “When I feel confused in group
work, I usually keep quite” was investigating whether students would ask for help when
they were confused. However, the second item and the third item were investigating
help-seeking behaviors in a more specific context, “familiarity with group members.” As
a result, more items are needed for assessing these two different communication
behaviors. A factor analysis with a large number of students would be needed to
investigate the factors within this researcher-designed instrument.
33
CHAPTER 5
DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS
The first purpose of this research was to explore relationships, in cooperative
groups within L2 learning, among students’ omniscient authority, perceived teacher
directedness, and students’ communication behaviors—with communication behaviors as
indicators for group autonomy. Literature reviews suggested specific elements that might
affect group autonomy include students’ beliefs of omniscient authority (Nelson, 1997)
and perceived teacher-directedness (Lindner, Dooley & Williams, 2003). Thus, this study
was designed to explore the relationships among students’ beliefs of omniscient authority,
perceived teacher directedness and communication behaviors. Additionally, previous
research has shown cultural differences existing in students’ epistemological beliefs
(Chan & Elloitt, 1998; Lee, 1995), instructors’ authority type, and communication
behaviors (Nelson, 1997) between Western cultures and Asian cultures. Therefore, this
study also investigated cultural differences for these three variables.
This research not only required analysis of the findings, but consideration in light
of previous research findings. In each section of the following discussion, I will firstly
summarize the findings in terms of cultural differences among students’ omniscient
authority beliefs, perceived teacher-directedness and students’ group communication
behaviors, and then I will discuss these variables with respect to correlations.
Finally, I
will address broader issues about epistemology beliefs, instructional behaviors, and
cooperative learning presented in the introduction that are most relevant to this study.
Description of Omniscient Authority Beliefs in Different Cultural Context
In this study, the first analysis explored the extent to which American students and
Chinese students differed in terms of their omniscient authority beliefs. Contrary to the
research hypotheses, the results indicated that Chinese students tended to believe that
knowledge comes from their own learning experiences while American students tended
34
to believe that knowledge comes from authorities. This finding was inconsistent with the
few studies of epistemology beliefs that have been conducted in Asian cultures on
students’ epistemology beliefs. For example, in Lee’s (1995) study of Korean graduate
students, the majority of Korean graduate students tended to believe that authorities such
as textbooks and academic instructors were dominant in students’ own learning
processes.
There are some possible explanations for the discrepancy in the findings between
Lee’s study and the findings in my study. One issue is the cultural bias underlying the
theoretical framework of students’ epistemology beliefs (Chan & Elliott, 2002). An
analysis of existing studies shows that the conceptual framework and instruments used in
epistemology beliefs research were developed in North American (Chan & Elliott, 2002).
In different cultural contexts, different dimensions or factors are proposed by empirical
research. For example, in some studies that have been conducted in Asian locations such
as HongKong and Taiwan (Chan & Elliott, 1998; 2002, 2004), four factors were extracted.
These factors included students’ beliefs about innate/fixed learning ability, learning as a
slow/fast process, a focus on authority/expert knowledge, and students’ certainty of
knowledge. However, the authority/expert dimension was not identified in the factor
analysis in North American college and university students (Schommer, 1989, 1990) and
Japanese language learners (Mori, 1997). Chinese students’ lower ratings on items of
omniscient authority beliefs may due to a discrepancy caused by a cultural bias
underlying the items.
In general, students’ omniscient authority beliefs are vulnerable to the influence of
subcultures. The present study was conducted in mainland China, which has a different
cultural context from HongKong and Taiwan. HongKong is a unique context, having
been simultaneously exposed to both Chinese and Western cultures because of being
under British rule for a long period of time (Chan & Elloitt, 2002, 2004). However,
students in mainland China are mainly exposed to a Confucianism-heritage culture.
Confucianism stresses that students should respect authorities, yet as well treat all
35
individuals as resources of knowledge. Therefore, Chinese students’ lower ratings on
items of omniscient authority beliefs may due to the Confucianism-heritage culture.
Interestingly, the current findings are inconsistent with Watkins and Biggs’ (1996)
study in which they found that Chinese students were willing to abide by authority, were
unquestioningly obedient, and relied on surface approaches to learning (e.g., rote
memorization). The difference between Watkins and Biggs’ findings and results for the
current study may possibly be accounted for by the fact that, in recent years, great
changes have taken place in China in terms of social economic status and family
structures. Recently, Conley, Pintrich, Vekiri and Harrison (2004) found that low SES and
low achievement children rated higher in omniscient authority beliefs items in
comparison to average SES and high achievement children. From the early 1980s to
current times, with an increase in Chinese economic development and the practice of a
birth control policy, almost all of the participants recruited in the Chinese sample are
from single child families with a fairly high standard of living. Therefore, compared to
students who were born 10 years ago (such as those who were recruited in the study by
Watkins & Biggs in 1996), the current higher SES in China could be a factor that
cultivates lower rating for omniscient authority beliefs among modern Chinese
undergraduate students.
The third possible explanation for the lower ratings in this study for omniscient
authority beliefs among Chinese students is the globalization and interaction between
eastern and western cultures. With the development of computer science and information
technology, most Chinese students in urban areas like Wuhan, where many of the Chinese
students were recruited, have full access to computers and networks. These learning
conditions enable Chinese students to obtain learning materials or information through
the internet. With this advancement, teachers and libraries are not the only learning
resources available. At the same time, like students in HongKong, Western culture and
thoughts might have had an impact on modern students in mainland China because of the
wide use of internet and other media such as TV programs. It is a common belief in
36
China that contemporary children resent strict and authoritarian parenting and seek
independence from both teachers’ and parents’ control.
Description of Teacher-directedness and its Relationship to Omniscient Authority and
Personal Epistemology
A second issue explored in this study was cultural differences between Chinese
and
American
students
in
terms
of
perceived
teacher-directedness.
Less
teacher-directedness, as it had been defined in previous chapters, is an indication of a
more teacher-supportive learning environment (Shell at al, 2005). The result of present
study indicated that Chinese instructors were seen as less directive than were American
instructors in second language classes while American students held less sophisticated
omniscient authority beliefs. Students’ higher omniscient authority beliefs were
significantly related to higher degrees of perceived teacher-directedness. No research had
been conducted to investigate the cultural differences in
students’ perceptions of
teacher-directedness, as has been done with omniscient authority beliefs; therefore, it is
not possible to compare the present results to previous studies. However, as expected,
results suggested that a high degree of teacher-directedness may be a link to naïve
omniscient authority beliefs.
The finding that a higher degree of teacher-directedness may be correlated to
higher ratings in omniscient authority beliefs provides a connection between two arrays
of research in terms of instructional behaviors and personal epistemology. One main
stream of research on epistemological beliefs has investigated teachers’ personal
epistemology and its impact on teaching goals and teaching strategies (e.g., Kang &
Wallace, 2004), teachers’ conception about teaching and learning (e.g., Chan & Elliott,
2004), and constructive or transmissive teaching behaviors (Brownlee, 2001; Berthelsen
et al, 2002). Another other main stream of research has investigated students’ personal
epistemology and its impacts on students’ learning strategies and outcomes (e.g.,
Schommer, 1990), internet-based learning behaviors (e.g., Braten & Stromso, 2004),
37
reading comprehension process (e.g., Braten, & Stromso, 2004), and learning goals and
intelligence (e.g., Braten & Stromso, 2004). However, very few research studies have
directly examined how students’ epistemological beliefs were shaped by teachers’
specific instructional behaviors that serve as an indicator of a constructive learning
environment (Berthelsn et al, 2002; Howard et al, 2000). The present research, however,
has made an association between these two constructs in term of the omniscient authority
dimension in students’ belief system and students’ perceptions of their teachers’
directedness.
Another interesting finding in this study was that students’ higher ratings on
omniscient authority beliefs only had a moderate correlation with a higher degree of
teacher-directedness. This finding implies the two key issues, the formation of students’
belief systems and effective instructional strategies. First, if instructional behaviors
cannot account for an establishment of students’ sophisticated epistemological beliefs,
what are key factors that influence the development of this belief system? Existing
research suggest that development of epistemological beliefs is shaped by students’ SES
(Conley, Pintrich, Vekiri & Harrison, 2004), age (Posner, et al, 1982), family influence
(Pai, 1990), education level (Kitchner & King, 1981), and exposure to complex learning
environments (Reybold, 2001). Contemporary Chinese culture is rapidly changing with
respect to all of these influences. Further research in needed to understand the impacts of
modern environmental influences on Chinese students’ learning-related beliefs.
The second issue is what kind of instructional behaviors are really supportive and
constructive and what instructional behaviors are controlling and destructive? In this
research, teacher-directedness was measured by asking students to rate a series of items
on their teachers’ instructional behaviors. However, this instrument itself does not capture
exactly what it tries to measure. For example, the item “In this class, the instructor gives
us specific instructions in what we are to do” may actually represent necessary and
supportive instructional behaviors and not controlling behaviors. In general and in most
circumstances, a specific instruction on learning activities can help students understand
38
the goal of the task at hand and increase students’ self-efficacy and learning motivation,
specially to a novice in certain domains. Additionally, other items such as “In this class, I
spend most of my time listening to the instructor” implies a transmissive teaching
approach that may be more closely related to teacher-directedness. Furthermore, some
items on this scale contains ambiguities, such as the item “In this class, the instructor tells
us what the important information is”. Instructors who do not provide important
information during instruction may be disorganized and destructive; however, instructors
who deliver important information only through formal lectures may be directive. On the
other hand, instructors who deliver important information wisely, such as providing
important information through systematic references and heuristic interaction with
students, may be supportive and constructive. Perhaps qualitative research should be
conducted to determine which instructional behaviors are really supportive and which are
not before the validation ofa teacher-directedness measurements can be determined.
Description of Communication Behaviors as Indications of Group Autonomy and its
Relationship to Omniscient Authority and Teacher-directedness
As mentioned previously, in this study, communication behaviors served as an
indication of group autonomy through linguistic, social cultural, and psychological
functions of communication. In this section, I will firstly introduce the structure of the
measurements and how this structure is related to the existing literature. Then, based on
the findings in the present research, I will discuss the correlations among various
dimensions within the measurements. Finally, I will discuss how different subscales relate
to omniscient authority beliefs and teacher-directedness.
In the researcher-designed measurements, the “correcting errors”, “expressing
ideas”, “clarifying own confusions” and “clarifying confusion for others” subscales were
designed to be related to the linguistic and social cultural functions of communication
feedback. These four subscales are closely tied with the model of the negotiation of
meaning (Pica, 1983) and very basic steps in critical thinking (Joeng, 2003). However,
39
the “time management” and “positive feedback” subscales were derived from the
psychological perspective of communication. This perspective emphasizes the control of
group process and the maintenance of group motivation. The social-cultural function is
embedded in all four subscales. For example, as to the “face saving” concept in different
cultures, students in “face saving” cultures may not correct others’ mistakes within
groups in order to avoid offending them. This concept is also embedded in other
subscales such as “time management”; students in “face saving” cultures may lose
control on group work because students may fail to stop activities unrelated to the topic.
Finally, it is important to realize that the different subscales may not represent
mutually-exclusive categories because, the linguistic, social-cultural and psychological
functions are exist simultaneously in real world group work.
An interesting phenomenon indicated by the results of this study is that the six
dimensions of communications behaviors were classified into two blocks by correlation
analysis. As shown in Table 7, there were moderate to strong correlations among the
correcting errors”, “expressing ideas”, “clarifying own confusion”, “clarifying confusion
for others” and “positive feedback” subscales. But as to “time management”, this
subscale only had a moderate correlation to “correcting errors”, “clarifying confusion for
other” and a marginal correlation to “positive feedback”. These results suggest that “time
management” may represent behaviors that qualitatively differ from other categories of
communication behaviors.
A similar phenomenon occurs with interpreting the correlations among “students’
omniscient authority beliefs”, “perceived teacher-directedness” and “communication
behaviors”. In the present study, “time management” was the only dimension of
communication behaviors that had a significant correlation with “omniscient authority
beliefs”, and that relationship was negative. However, “time management” was not
significantly correlated with “teacher-directedness”. At the same time, all the other five
dimensions of communication behaviors showed marginal to moderate correlations with
“teacher-directedness”. One possible model of the relationships among the six
40
dimensions of communication behaviors and their relationships to “omniscient authority
beliefs” and “teacher-directedness” are displayed in Figure 2:
Basic Skills
Correcting Errors
Expressing Ideas
Clarifying Own Confusion
Clarifying Confusion for Others
Teacher-directedness
Omniscient Authority Beliefs
Meta-cognitive Skills
Timing Management
Figure 2: Relationship among Teacher-directedness, Omniscient Authority beliefs
and Six Dimensions of Communication Behaviors
A possible interpretation of this phenomenon is that “time management” is really
an intra-group skill that is differing from the other communication behaviors. In short,
“timing management” is a meta-cognitive skill, while the remaining communication
behaviors involve basic cognitive processes that occur in the beginning phase of critical
thinking within group discussions (Joeng, 2003). Some pieces of existing literature may
account for this finding. First, in the theoretical framework of self-regulation,
Zimmerman (2006) proposed that self-regulation includes three circular phases: the
forethought phase, the performance phase, and the self-reflection phase. Zimmerman
(2006) also suggested that “time management refers to estimating and budgeting one’s
use of time” (p 710), which is a meta-cognitive skill that occurs during the performance
phase of self-regulation. Meanwhile, Schommer (1990, 1994) and Qian and Alvermann
(1995) have demonstrated that higher ratings of omniscient authority beliefs are related to
more sophisticated meta-cognitive processes. Chan and Elloitt (2004) also indicated that
mature personal epistemology positively influences how individuals understand the
41
nature of tasks at hand and how they decide what strategies are appropriate for dealing
with complex and ill-structured situations. Therefore, in an ill-structured situation such as
cooperative learning, omniscient authority beliefs may interfere with “timing
management.” As a result, Chinese students, who had more sophisticated omniscient
authority’s beliefs, tended to have lower scores on timing management.
The
correlation
between
teacher-directedness
and
five
dimensions
of
communication behaviors can be explained in the theoretical framework of language
acquisition. More specific, the basic communication behaviors such as “expressing ideas”
and “clarifying confusions” are internalized from students’ learning contexts. From
Vygotsky’s point of view, “the key to internalization resides in the uniquely human
capability to imitate the intentional activity of other humans” (p 207, Vanpatten &
Williams, 2007). Imitation is not mindless mimicking as is often associated with
behaviorism in psychology but involves goal-directed cognitive activity that can result in
transformations of the original model. The important feature of imitation in terms of its
relationship with internalization is that the imitation process may not occur immediately
after a given pattern appears in the learner’s linguistic environment (Vanpatten &
Williams, 2007). In the learner’s linguistic environment, instructors who are more
directive may provide more pattern models for imitation. These patterns, however, will be
internalized into students’ linguistic system sooner or later. This can explain why
American students provide positive feedback to group members more frequently than
Chinese students, because American instructors are more skillful at motivating students
through providing positive feedback to students in general.
The above sections summarized and interpreted the results with associated
theatrical frameworks in the domain of epistemological beliefs, instructional behaviors,
and second language acquisition. The following sections highlight the limitation of the
study, the implications of the study for future teaching and learning, and
recommendations for future research.
42
Limitations
Three major limitations for this study are related to the nature of two different
education systems, the developing process of measurements and sample size, and the
research design. First, Chinese students and American students come from two different
education systems although they shared similar characteristics such as age, grade, and
major. In China, instructors in JiangHan Universities teach English as a foreign language
through different subjects such as reading comprehension, spoken English, and English
writing and so on. Furthermore, instructors in JiangHan University are all independent
instructors who can plan their instruction freely. However, American students such as in
Florida State University are taught in a mixed language class in which reading
comprehension, spoken Spanish and writing are taught during the same class.
Additionally, instructors in Florida State University are mostly graduate teaching
assistants who have less teaching experience than their Chinese counterparts. Therefore,
even if the research indicated that Chinese instructors were more supportive than
American instructors, it is unwise to generalize this finding to all the Chinese and
American instructor populations. Similarly, Chinese students in this study were recruited
in a metropolitan area in central China, while American students were recruited from a
middle sized city in the southern part of America, their beliefs and communication
behaviors cannot represent the whole population in China or in the United States.
Furthermore, another limitation comes from the validity and reliability of
measurements. As mentioned above, omniscient authority beliefs is a subset of
epistemological beliefs, which is a valid factor in Asian studies, but it is not always a
valid factor in North America. As to the teacher-directedness scale, some items do not
seem to capture what they want to measure because these items can be interpreted in
multiple ways. Some items can be considered as indicators of supportive rather than
directive. Additionally, the communication behaviors scale was a researcher-designed
measurement. The six dimensions were determined by existing theory and research and
not validated by factor analysis due to an inadequate sample size. However, in general, all
43
the subscales in this study had reasonable reliabilities, which enabled further data
analysis and interpretation.
As for the research design, quantitative research alone may not be adequate to
fully investigate the research questions due to the nature of epistemological beliefs and
group processes. Omniscient authority beliefs, as a subset of personal beliefs, can not be
represented as quantitative data (Chan & Elloitt, 2002, 2004). Cooperative learning
processes are an ill-structured situation in which interaction patterns can vary extremely
when different student-compositions are involved. Therefore, mixed research methods,
both quantitative and qualitative, are advocated for future studies.
Implications of This Study for Teaching and Learning and Future Directions
This study first posits its importance in the field of teachers’ professional training
and teaching practice in general. This study showed that teachers have two roles in the
classrooms, one is the leader and designer of classroom activities, the other is the model
for students to imitate. As the leader and designer of classroom activities, teachers who
have more sophisticated epistemological beliefs may choose teaching methods and
strategies that are linked to a more supportive and constructive learning environment for
students. The learning environment, as indicated by this study, may nurture the
epistemological and meta-cognitive development among students. Therefore, the first
step in teachers’ education is to create a constructive learning environment for pre-service
teachers.
As to teachers’ role as models, more specific standards for supportive teaching
methods and behaviors should be studied and implicated in teachers’ education programs.
Systematic qualitative research on constructive teaching behaviors should be conducted
in different cultural contexts, and these qualitative data can serve as models in teachers’
training programs.
As to intra-group communication skills, this study extended existing literatures as
it may suggest a new direction for designing cooperative learning skill-training
44
inventions. This study concluded that, similar to other intellectual skills, intra-group
communication skills may be classified into two groups: basic cognitive skills for basic
information processing and meta-cognitive skills for monitoring group processes. These
two groups of skills may be internalized from two different resources. The basic
cognitive skills for basic information processing skills may be internalized directly from
teachers’ behaviors; and the meta-cognitive skills for monitoring group processes may be
driven by personal epistemology, which may also be mediated by instructional behaviors.
Therefore, in the teaching practice of second languages, on one hand, teachers should
firstly act as a role model and give students authentic linguistic patterns for imitation. In
order to accomplish this goal, language teachers have to be knowledgeable about the
cultural background, the social structure, and even the teacher-students relationships in
the target language countries. On the other hand, teachers should be supportive when they
are designing learning materials and learning activities so as to enable students to
establish sophisticated personal epistemology and meta-cognitive skills through their own
learning experiences.
More than simply reflecting the cultural difference in terms of epistemological
beliefs, teacher-directedness, and communication skills between Chinese and American
students, I found great value in investigating processes involved with epistemological
beliefs, constructive teaching behaviors, and communication skills.
It is suggested that in researching epistemological beliefs, future directions may
include qualitative and longitude research in different cultural contexts. These studies
may thoroughly uncover the developmental process of students’ epistemological beliefs.
It will be interesting to see how individual anecdotes help people understand and interpret
the nature of knowledge. These studies also are helpful to provide clues to validate
epistemological beliefs measurements in various cultural contexts. It would also be
interesting to investigate mismatches between teachers’ and students’ epistemologies,
especially when students are adults. Adult students, unlike young children, are more
self-determinant on their own learning processes and strategies. It is predictable when
45
teachers and adult students have different personal epistemology, students may be
resentful to the teaching strategies and teaching methods utilized in class. How to solve
the conflict is another expansion of possible research topics.
Another big issue is how to understand the sophisticated omniscient authority
beliefs demonstrated by Chinese students because the findings in this study are
inconsistent with previous studies conducted in other Asian countries and areas. Chan and
Elloitt (2004) argue that HongKong students have mature belief in omniscient authority
because the traditional Confucian-heritage has been weakened by Western culture in
HongKong in recent years. However, I do not agree with his suggestion that
Confucian-heritage is the source for omniscient authority because many lectures in the
Analects of Confucius point out that individuals can learn something from everyone.
Furthermore, Chan and Elloitt (2002, 2004) also mentioned that Confucian heritage is
positively related to the maturity of personal epistemology in terms of the factor of
certainty of knowledge, organization of knowledge, control of learning, and speed of
learning. Therefore, more thorough investigations of Confucian-heritage may be helpful
with explaining why Chinese students are different from their counterparts in other Asian
countries. Confucian heritage may be a precious treasure for all people’s learning in we
can determine how it is related to epistemology.
As for communication skills, future research may involve the restructuring of
measurements. One reason is that, as globalization has occurred, the traditional view of
cultural dimensions may not elicit significant cultural differences between China and
western countries, especially to those Chinese youth who are labeled as “single child” in
the family. These children are provided with abundant learning resources such as
references from internet or other media (e.g., educational TV program). Chinese children
are exposed to both Chinese traditional culture and western cultures through educational
technologies. Therefore, Chinese youth who are learning English as a second language
are very aware that they are learning western cultures as well. Furthermore, the new
classification of communication skills as basic skills and meta-cognitive skills may be
46
more compatible with the theatrical framework. However, more empirical studies should
be conducted to explore the validation of this new structure. After the restructuring the
measurement of communication skills, one could investigate the multiple factors of
epistemological beliefs and how they are related to the development of intra-group
communication skills.
47
APPENDIX A:
MEASUREMENT FOR OMNISICENT AUTHORITY BELIEFS, PERCEIVED
TEACHER-DIRECTEDNESS, AND COMMUNICATION BEHAVIORS
Demographic Information:
School name: __________________________
Gender: ______________________________
Age: ________________________________
Ethnicity/nationality: ___________________
Authority and Learning
Directions: The following surveys contain statements about your beliefs about authority,
learning, and the extent to which you rely on your teacher to direct the class. Please rate
the statements as to how true they are for you. If you strongly agree with the statement,
mark 7; if you strongly disagree with the statement, mark 1. If you agree with the
statement more or less, find the number between 1 and 7 that best describes you.
1
2
3
Strongly
4
5
6
7
Neutral
Strongly
Disagree
Agree
1.
Sometimes, I don’t believe the facts in textbooks written by authorities.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2.
I prefer to rely on a teachers’ expertise rather than my own judgment.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
3.
How much a person gets out of school mostly depends on the quality of the 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
professor.
4.
People who challenge a professor are overconfident.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
5.
I tend to believe what the professor says rather than what students say.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
6.
I still believe in what the teachers say even though it differ it differ from 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
what I know.
7.
Even advice from experts should be questioned.
1
48
1. In this class, I spend most of my time listening to the instructor.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2. In this class, the instructor tells us what the important information is.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
3. In this class, the instructor gives us specific instructions in what we are to do.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
4. In this class, I know how I am doing mostly by the grades I get on 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
assignments and tests.
5. In this class, the instructor focuses on getting us to learn the right answer to 1
questions.
6. In this class, I get most of the information from the instructor.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
7. In this class, I get most of the information from the textbook.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8. In this class, the instructor primarily determines the topics we will learn.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Communication Styles
Directions: The following surveys contain statements about your communication styles
in small groups. Please rate the statements as to how true they are for you. If you think
the statement is very true of you, mark 7; if a statement is not at all true of you, mark 1.
If the statement is more or less true of you, find the number between 1 and 7 that best
describes you.
1
2
3
Not at all
4
5
6
7
Neutral
Very true
true of me
of me
Communication Style Survey: Correcting errors
1.
When I think someone makes a mistake, I offer another option for group 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
members.
2.
When I think someone makes a mistake, I will tell him/her the correct 1
answer directly.
3.
When I think someone makes a mistake, I will explain why the answer is 1
wrong.
4.
When I think someone makes a mistake, I just simply tell him/her that 1
he/she is wrong.
5.
When I think someone makes a mistake, I prefer to drop a hint rather than 1
tell him/her directly that he/she is wrong.
49
6.
When I think someone makes a mistake, I will check to see if I have fully 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
understood his/her meaning.
Communication Style Survey: Expressing ideas
7.
I will give my opinions even if the majority of the group members hold a 1
difference.
8.
I will give my opinions even if other excellent students hold a difference.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
9.
I usually say nothing when I encounter different opinions from my group 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
12. When I hold a different opinion, I usually provide a hint that the person 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
14. When I feel confused, I will look for some clues from the group 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
members.
10. When I encounter opinions from group members that conflict with my 1
own, I usually wait to see if they will change their opinions.
11. I will provide evidence to support myself when I disagree with others.
could be wrong.
Communication Style Survey: Clarify my confusion
13. When I feel confused in group work, I usually keep quite.
conversation to help me understand.
15. When I feel confused, I only ask other people to clarify their ideas if I am 1
familiar with them.
16. When I feel confused, I ask other group members to help me understand 1
even if I am not familiar with them.
17. When I feel confused, I rephrase what other people have said to check my 1
understanding.
18. When I feel confused, I repeat exactly what other people say to check my 1
understanding.
Communication Style Survey: Clarify other’s confusion
19. When I am required to clarify my ideas, I usually rephrase what I have said 1
to make myself understood.
20. When I am required to clarify my ideas, I repeat what I have said to make 1
myself understood.
21. When I am required to clarify my ideas, I provide more details to make 1
myself understood.
22. When I see other people having difficulty in clarifying their ideas, I will 1
rephrase what they have said.
50
23. When I see other people having difficulty in completing their ideas, I will 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
32. I will express agreement when I think other members are right or have a 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
35. When someone makes a suggestion that is not liked by the group, I always 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2
3
4
5
6
7
complete their explanation for them.
Communication Style Survey: Timing control
24. Someone in the group usually corrects me immediately, when I make a 1
mistake.
25. I usually limit the length of my comments so other people have a chance to 1
say their comments.
26. When I feel someone speaks for too long time, I will remind him/her that 1
other members need a chance to say their comments.
27. When I detect any mistakes made by other members, I will correct it 1
immediately, so we don’t lose time.
28. When someone begins to say something unrelated to the group’s work, I 1
will remind him/her to come back to the topic.
29. Other group members usually remind me come back to the topic when I 1
begin to say something unrelated to the topic.
30. I am often stopped by other members when I make very long comments.
Communication Style Survey: Positive feedback
31. I give verbal praise when I think other members do a good job.
good idea.
33. I will take other members’ perspective into consideration when I make a 1
summary about the group’s work.
34. I always combine and build on the ideas that are expressed by others.
try to explore their point of view
36. I always express optimism about the team being able to achieve success.
51
1
APPENDIX B:
APPROVAL MEMORANDUM AND CONSENT LETTER
52
53
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH
Feng Zhou was born in Wu Han, the capitol city of Hu Bei province, China, the
daughter of Gengyun Zhou and Chunxiu Zhou. She attended HuaZhong University of
Science and Technology, HanKou Branch (now merged into and named as JiangHan
University), and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English language. With a desire to
apply psychological principles to teaching English as a second language for Chinese
students, she came to Florida State University (FSU) to obtain a Masters Degree. To
obtain her goal, she enrolled in FSU’s Educational Psychology and Learning Systems
Program, majoring in Learning and Cognition. Now, having obtained her Masters Degree
in Learning and Cognition, she is planning on continuing her studies with the goal of
obtaining a Ph.D. in Learning and Cognition.
Through all her academic endeavors, she is very grateful and honored by her
parents’, Gengyun Zhou and Chunxiu Zhou, support.
59