A Study of Student Pronoun Use in Online Courses

• In Event: 61.086 - Roundtable Session 21
  In Roundtable Session: 61.086-7 - School Culture, Socialization, and Climate Influences on Learning Environments

Abstract

In this paper we examined pronoun usage in the threaded asynchronous discussions of 17 graduate online courses. We found wide variation, across courses, both in the use of pronouns and the prevalence of particular pronoun families. Student discussions containing first and second person pronouns tended to contain more notes and tended to use simpler, more informal language. On the other hand, discussions that favored third person pronouns tended to contain text that was written at a more advanced level. It is proposed that differences in pronoun frequency and the frequency of different pronoun families are indicative of different online cultures and instructor expectations. Pronouns metrics may provide instructors with useful indicators of student progress and engagement in online collaboration.

Author

• Jim Hewitt, OISE/University of Toronto