Editor\u27s Page

Now in its nineteenth year, the Basic Communication Course Annual continues to serve as an important outlet within the discipline for scholarship related to the way we teach, manage, and evaluate the basic course. Each year the Annual offers some of the best research on basic course pedagogy helping to position it as the primary source for teachers and scholars working to improve the quality of the basic course at their respective institutions. The Annual\u27s success has always been attributed to the community of scholars who continue to support the journal as contributors, editorial board members, and its readership. I wish to thank the efforts of the Annual\u27s previous editors, Deanna Sellnow, Craig Newburger, and Larry Hugenberg. I would especially like to thank Scott Titsworth, whose assistance has been instrumental as I have worked to complete my first issue

Editor\u27s Page

Note: The Editor\u27s Page from Volume 20 was repeated in Volume 21 by mistake of the publisher at the time, American Press. It is included here as printed, but it does not pertain to the content in this issue

Implementing Technology into the Basic Course: The Influence of Sex and Instructional Technology Use on Teacher Immediacy and Student Affective Learning

This study explored the impact that instructional technology use and instructor gender have on students’ perceptions of immediacy and affective learning in the basic communication course. Participants included 1526 undergraduate students from 72 sections of the basic course over the course of four semesters. A series of 2 X 2 factorial designs were used to uncover main and interaction effects. Results of the Multivariate analyses revealed a two-way interaction effect of technology use by instructor gender with the use of presentational software, and main effects for each form of technology (i.e., presentational software, video material, course webpages, course chatrooms, online testing, overheads). Follow-up procedures revealed significant differences for each of the dependent measures. Specifically, male instructors not using presentational software were perceived to use significantly lower levels of verbal and nonverbal immediacy, and to produce lower levels of affective learning for their students

The Influence of Instructor Status and Sex on Student Perceptions of Teacher Credibility and Confirmation Across Time

Universities continue to rely heavily on graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) to teach many of their entry level courses, with limited research emphasizing student perceptions of GTAs. With this in mind, the purpose of this investigation was to assess the combined influence of instructor status (GTA vs. Professor) and sex on student perceptions of teacher credibility and confirmation behaviors across time. Results from the repeated measures analysis indicated interaction effects for instructor sex and time, whereby female instructors (regardless of their status) were perceived to have higher levels of character, trustworthiness, and perceived caring. Three-way interaction effects emerged for instructor confirmation dimensions of demonstrated interest and teaching style. For each of these dimensions, female GTAs and professors experienced marked increases after student initial perceptions, while male GTAs were perceived to decrease dramatically

Stretching the Academic Dollar: The Appropriateness of Utilizing Instructor Assistants in the Basic Course

As more universities across the country are feeling the pressures of providing an increasingly rigid financial accountability to tax payers and state legislatures, speech and communication departments find themselves in a precarious position. Namely, how can communication departments teach the budding number of students enrolled in their courses with little increase in budget, while continuing to produce effective speakers? One common answer to this dilemma involves the use of graduate students, and in some cases undergraduate students, as teaching assistants in the basic course. This study examines the efficacy of using undergraduate instructor assistants in the basic course at a large Midwestern University and addresses potential stumbling blocks in training, such as speaker order and rater error. Thirty-eight undergraduate instructor assistants were randomly assigned to one of four treatment groups and asked to grade four 10-minute persuasive speeches following their eight-week training course. An ANCOVA was used to examine significant differences across presentation grades for speakers in each group, while an ANOVA was used to determine differences in the quality of comments based on speaker order. No significant differences were identified in either analysis suggesting that when properly trained, undergraduate instructor assistants can grade consistently across multiple groups regardless of speaker order

Bias in the Evaluation Process: Influences of Speaker Order, Speaker Quality, and Gender on Rater Error in the Performance Based Course

This study examines how variations in speaker order increase the potential for rater error in the performance based course. Seventy-six undergraduate raters were randomly assigned to one of eight treatment groups and asked to grade eight-week training course. Speaker order and presentation quality varied across groups and an ANOVA was used to examine significant differences across rater assessments, feedback quality and rater gender. Significant main effects were identified in each of the eight treatment groups suggesting that speaker order influenced rater scoring

“Becoming a Family”: Developmental Processes Represented in Blended Family Discourse

We adopted a process-focus in order to gain a deeper understanding of how (step) blended family members experiencing different developmental pathways discursively represented their processes of becoming a family. Using a qualitative/interpretive method, we analyzed 980 pages of interview transcripts with stepparents and stepchildren. We studied the first four years of family development, using the five developmental pathways developed by Baxter, Braithwaite, and Nicholson (1999). Three salient issues identified in the family experiences were boundary management, solidarity, and adaptation. While the negotiation of these issues varied across the five trajectories, there were commonalities across family experiences that helped determine whether families had a successful experience of becoming a family. Implications for blended family researchers and practitioners are also discussed