Juggling institutional and social demands : a conversation analysis of engineering students’ interactions in self-managed problem-based learning

There has been an increase in the use of problem-based learning (PBL) - a student-centred approach involving authentic problem cases and collaboration - within the engineering disciplines in response to the demands of 21st century industry. The vast majority of PBL research over the years, however, has either focused on determining its effectiveness, or reported on staff and students’ perceptions about the approach. Much less attention has been given to the group practices that lie at the heart of PBL. Ironically, then, as a pedagogical approach that is so dependent on social interaction, we know very little about its interactional elements - about how it actually works. With the aim of opening this interactional ‘black box’, this study analysed almost 100 hours of naturalistic video-recordings involving seven groups of engineering students undertaking PBL at a UK university. This thesis reports on the findings of the floating facilitator PBL model, in which learning is effectively tutorless, with only intermittent tutor contact. Conversation analysis was used to examine students’ actual social interactions in this learning setting; to finely unpack the conversational mechanics behind PBL that have long been overlooked. Although the student-centredness of PBL made the educational experience less formal in nature, this democratisation of institutional structures also allowed ‘outside’ social norms to percolate through. Added to the absence of the tutor, PBL thus made matters more complicated for students, forcing them to balance wider social values with their newfound institutional responsibilities (i.e. to self-manage their group work). Ironically, the groups co constructed themselves as being largely detached from academia; as ‘playing it cool’ in blending in as (‘non-academic’) equals. At the same time, however, with no guiding tutor, the students also oriented to their collective need to ‘do education’. In managing this dilemma - and in an apparent resistance against being substituted for the absent tutor - they treated the workload as a collective burden to be eradicated, neutralised all displays of authority, and made use of subtle interactional strategies in self-managing the likes of knowledge disagreements and social loafing. Such findings show that students do not always engage with (tutorless) PBL as intended, and provide a case for the continued naturalistic study of such conversational intricacies.There has been an increase in the use of problem-based learning (PBL) - a student-centred approach involving authentic problem cases and collaboration - within the engineering disciplines in response to the demands of 21st century industry. The vast majority of PBL research over the years, however, has either focused on determining its effectiveness, or reported on staff and students’ perceptions about the approach. Much less attention has been given to the group practices that lie at the heart of PBL. Ironically, then, as a pedagogical approach that is so dependent on social interaction, we know very little about its interactional elements - about how it actually works. With the aim of opening this interactional ‘black box’, this study analysed almost 100 hours of naturalistic video-recordings involving seven groups of engineering students undertaking PBL at a UK university. This thesis reports on the findings of the floating facilitator PBL model, in which learning is effectively tutorless, with only intermittent tutor contact. Conversation analysis was used to examine students’ actual social interactions in this learning setting; to finely unpack the conversational mechanics behind PBL that have long been overlooked. Although the student-centredness of PBL made the educational experience less formal in nature, this democratisation of institutional structures also allowed ‘outside’ social norms to percolate through. Added to the absence of the tutor, PBL thus made matters more complicated for students, forcing them to balance wider social values with their newfound institutional responsibilities (i.e. to self-manage their group work). Ironically, the groups co constructed themselves as being largely detached from academia; as ‘playing it cool’ in blending in as (‘non-academic’) equals. At the same time, however, with no guiding tutor, the students also oriented to their collective need to ‘do education’. In managing this dilemma - and in an apparent resistance against being substituted for the absent tutor - they treated the workload as a collective burden to be eradicated, neutralised all displays of authority, and made use of subtle interactional strategies in self-managing the likes of knowledge disagreements and social loafing. Such findings show that students do not always engage with (tutorless) PBL as intended, and provide a case for the continued naturalistic study of such conversational intricacies

Civil engineering 4 real (CE4R): co-curricular learning for undergraduates

Vocational disciplines such as engineering provide an ideal opportunity for contextualising the curriculum. The provision of co-curricular activities can stimulate students to assimilate their prior knowledge and skills whilst enhancing employability attributes. Team-based co-curricular activities linked to problem-based learning can offer students a quasi-authentic experience of engineering practice. In this paper, we provide a case study of a successful co-curricular initiative supported by local civil engineering employers. Civil Engineering 4 Real (CE4R) are evening workshops facilitated by practicing engineers, where student attendance is voluntary. Students use authentic documentation and collaborate in peer learning to solve industrial problems. CE4R has assisted student’s anticipatory socialisation into their disciplinary profession. However, further research is required to establish the cognitive legacy that students gain from attending CE4R. There is also a need to explore the synergy that could be prompted through understanding the boundaries between CE4R and the programme curriculum

Stepping back from crisis points : the provision and acknowledgement of support in an online suicide discussion forum

Suicide is a global health concern, though little is known about the social practices that might support those who are contemplating suicide. Online forums provide a unique insight into the anonymous discussion of suicide, including sociocultural norms about suicide and the delicate management of online interaction. This article examines the provision and acknowledgement of support in an online discussion forum about suicide, using discursive psychology to analyse the textual interaction. The analysis illustrates how forum threads function as case studies, and enable members to gain support on numerous occasions. In this way, members can gain help at crisis points as and when these occur, while still maintaining authenticity as a valid forum member. The analysis also provides additional evidence for models of suicide which highlight the fluid nature of suicidality and contributes to the preventative work on suicide by demonstrating how support can be provided at crisis points. 2 Suicidal behaviours represent a global public health concern and substantial research effort has gone into identifying specific risk and protective factors (e.g., O'Connor & Nock, 2014) . The rise of technology provides a unique opportunity to examine suicidal issues in online spaces (Mishara & Kerkhof, 2013) , yet research to date has focused mainly on the motivations and individual characteristics of those using the internet for this purpose, rather than on the social practices in the online spaces themselves. Following Horne and Wiggins (2009) and Paulus and Varga (2015), this article focuses on the provision and acknowledgement of support in an o nline suicide di scussion forum. Specifically, the aim of this article is to explicate the interactional features of support in the suicide forums, and of the potential for members to be supported by others by being metaphorically talked back from the ‘edge’; i.e., representing a shift from being at a crisis point to a stance that might still be troubled but is not immediately suicidal. As such, the article provides additional empirical support for discursive accounts of managing health identities online as well as demonstrating the potential of qualitative analyses to contribute to preventative work on suicid

The quarterly big interview with Dr Sally Wiggins

Having completed her PhD at Loughborough University in 2002, Sally worked first at Nottingham Trent University, then at the University of Strathclyde for over 12 years. During this time, Sally established herself as a social psychologist with expertise in discursive psychology through a wide range of projects including analyses of family mealtimes, weight management treatment within the NHS, online suicide help forums, and student tutorial group interactions. In 2016, Sally moved to Linköping University (Sweden), where she is currently senior lecturer in social psychology. In 2017, she released the methods textbook, Discursive Psychology: Theory, Method and Applications. I became enthralled with social psychology thanks to Sally’s undergraduate teaching and was delighted to catch up with her in October 2018 as part of The Quarterly’s Big Interview series

Examining self-managed problem-based learning interactions in engineering education

With the increasing complexity of the engineering role, today’s graduates must be capable of confronting both technical and societal problems; underpinned by effective teamwork at their core. Problem-based learning has been implemented in engineering to better prepare students for modern industry. However, limited research has examined the complex social processes involved in PBL. The present study, therefore, reports on how students working in tutorless PBL groups – owing to teaching limitations – must effectively self-manage their team efforts if they are to succeed. This PBL arrangement involved a ‘floating facilitator’ but the analysis focuses exclusively on the students’ tutorless interactions. The data collected is from 22 chemical engineering undergraduates in four groups, and consists of naturalistic video-recordings of 32 PBL meetings (35 h). This corpus was examined empirically using conversation analysis to elucidate students’ recurrent communicational practices. The microanalyses showed how students continuously established PBL as the collective responsibility of the group. Furthermore, students maintained ‘average’, equal social identities, and used humour/self-deprecation in constructing an informal learning environment. In the absence of the tutor who would normally maintain cohesion, these strategies offer a means through which students adapt to the unfamiliarity of the tutorless setting, where no member is positioned as the substitute tutor

Knowledge disagreement formulations in problem-based learning tutorials: balancing pedagogical demands with ‘saving face’

As a pedagogical approach that aims to develop students' group-working skills and to challenge their current knowledge, problem-based learning (PBL) provides a unique setting in which to examine disagreements in interaction. Previous research on disagreements in classrooms have typically examined tutor-student interaction or student-student interaction in which a tutor is present. The current paper, however, examines tutorless PBL tutorials and focuses specifically on those moments in which knowledge claims are challenged by other students. The data comprise of 30 hours of video recordings from 24 chemical engineering PBL tutorials in a Scottish university. Conversation analysis was used to identify 101 disagreement formulations, many of which follow the format seen in other classroom settings (e.g. agreement-prefaced disagreements). A subset of disagreement formulations manage epistemic responsibility through invoking expert sources (e.g. tutor-provided worksheets and academically superior out-group members). Through invoking an expert source in this way, students attend to the pedagogical activities - without tutor assistance - while minimising the conversational trouble associated with the act of 'doing' disagreement (i.e. indirectly enacting disagreements whilst maintaining a neutral stance). This paper thus contributes to CA literature on disagreements, while providing a unique insight into PBL tutorial interaction. Directions for future research are suggested