A Meta-analytical Review of the Effects of Different Self-Assessment Interventions on Students’ Academic Performance: Insights from a New Taxonomy

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Abstract

Self-assessment is a loosely defined term, encompassing a spectrum of practices from simple self-grading to intricate processes where students use feedback to evaluate their work against specific criteria. Addressing this jingle-jangle fallacy requires a systematic taxonomy that distinguishes and categorises various self-assessment practices uniformly. Crucial attempts have been made at such classifications (Panadero et al., 2016). Boud and Brew (1995) categorised three types of self-assessment based on the “knowledge interest” pursued by students in different tasks, while Tan (2001) proposed a taxonomy consisting of six self-assessment formats considering teacher involvement linked to formative and summative assessment purposes. Taras (2010) identified five self-assessment formats, based on power dynamics between students and teachers and the transparency of the self-assessment format. Panadero and colleagues’ typology (2010; 2013) proposed three self-assessment formats focusing on the presence and form of assessment criteria, while Brown and Harris (2013) classified three types of self-assessment by the format of its execution. More recently, Andrade (2019) developed a taxonomy concentrating on targets, purposes, and methods of self-assessment.
While these attempts have enhanced our understanding of self-assessment practices, current taxonomies have limitations. Boud and Brew's (1995) taxonomy, for example, is more about the purposes of self-assessment than actual practices. The other taxonomies address different self-assessment methods but share common weaknesses: ambiguous boundaries between methods, confusion between self-assessment tools and methods, and the challenge of exhaustively listing self-assessment methods given the complexity of learning contexts.
This study has two primary objectives. First, it aims to develop a new taxonomy of self-assessment in instructional contexts from a process perspective. This views self-assessment as a learning process where students progressively improve their judgment skills rather than as a static point-in-time activity. This proposed taxonomy, grounded in the self-assessment process model (Yan & Brown, 2017; Yan & Carless, 2021), focuses on the actions students take during self-assessment.
Second, leveraging the developed taxonomy, a meta-analytical review will synthesise the effects of self-assessment on students’ academic performance. This review will scrutinise the differential effects of various self-assessment practices as categorised by the new taxonomy. The meta-analysis will address two specific research questions: (1) What is the overall effect of self-assessment interventions on students’ academic performance? (2) How do the intervention effects vary according to the new self-assessment taxonomy? The findings will illuminate the conditions under which self-assessment practices are most beneficial.
Together, the proposed taxonomy and the meta-analytic review will advance the field of self-assessment by (1) providing a robust framework for future research that offers a systematic coherence in describing and classifying self-assessment formats that provide; (2) offering a nuanced understanding of how different self-assessment interventions affect academic performance, revealing the conditions under which these practices are most beneficial, and (3) potentially guide and inform the design and implementation of self-assessment strategies to maximise their positive impact on learning. By bridging theoretical conceptualization with empirical evidence, this study has the potential to transform how self-assessment is understood, researched, and applied across diverse educational contexts, ultimately enhancing learning outcomes through more targeted and effective self-assessment practices.

Authors

• Zi Yan, The Education University of Hong Kong

• Norman B. Mendoza, The Education University of Hong Kong