Social Network Interaction in Online Discussion Over Time and Teaching Presence

• In Event: Instructional Technology SIG Poster Session 2: Instructional Technology in Higher Education and Corporate Settings

Abstract

Teaching presence is critical to online discussion instructions. However, it is unclear how students may develop social network interaction and how teaching presence may relate to network interaction development. This study empirically investigated how various aspects of students’ prominence (i.e., betweenness centrality, closeness centrality, eigenvector centrality, & PageRank) in social network interaction changed over weekly online discussion and if teaching presence moderated the aforementioned trends. The results suggested that social network interaction prominence in betweenness, eigenvector, and PageRank remained the same over time. However, the prominence in closeness was declining over time. Furthermore, student teaching presence seemed to positively alter the flat trend in betweenness.

Authors

• Christina Gabaldon, Northern Arizona University

• Cherng-Jyh Yen, Old Dominion University

• Chih-Hsiung Tu, Northern Arizona University

• Benning Wentworth Tieke, Northern Arizona University

• William Terrill, Northern Arizona University

• Candi Running Bear, Northern Arizona University

• Laura Esthela Sujo-Montes, Northern Arizona University