Investigating the Effect of Emotional Tone on Learners' Engagement and Peer Acknowledgment in Social Annotation

• In Event: Emotions and Motivation in Technology-Based Environments

Abstract

Social annotation fosters collaborative learning by encouraging knowledge sharing and community inquiry. However, previous research has primarily focused on the cognitive aspect of social annotation. This study aims to contribute an emotional perspective to the existing literature on social annotation. Sentiment analysis was used to analyze learners' emotional tone in 1954 social annotations, and the Linear Mixed Effect model was utilized to examine the effect of emotional tone on reading engagement and peer acknowledgment. Our findings indicate that students who posted more positive sentiment comments were also more likely to spend more time engaging in social annotation and receive peer acknowledgment. These findings offer new insights into social annotation by emphasizing the importance of emotional tone in social annotation.

Authors

• Xiaoshan Huang, McGill University

• Juan Zheng, Lehigh University

• Shan Li, Lehigh University

• Gaoxia Zhu, National Institute of Education - Nanyang Technological University

• Hanxiang Du, Western Washington University

• Tianlong Zhong, Nanyang Technological University

• Chenyu Hou, National Institute of Education - Nanyang Technological University

• Susanne P. Lajoie, McGill University