Learning Effects of Attention Guidance in Online Discussions

This paper reports on the design and learning effects of an awareness mechanism integrated into an anchored discussion system. Drawing on social constructivist literature, the design aims to attract, retain, and if necessary reacquire students' attention on instructional materials' central principles in document-based asynchronous online discussions. To form a holistic picture, we operationalized learning across three dependent variables: perceived learning, knowledge gain, and learning efficiency. We performed an experimental study (N=64) across two sections of a blended-format human-computer interaction course to evaluate our design. Results show that the proposed design increased students' perceptions of learning. However, the difference in knowledge gain scores was marginally significant, and represented a medium effect size. Interestingly, we found that our design afforded more efficient learning. Moreover, we discovered students' perceptions of learning to be a significant predictor of their learning efficiency. Theoretical and practical implications are also discussed.