TY - JOUR
T1 - Does agency matter?
T2 - Exploring the impact of controlled behaviors within a game-based environment
AU - Snow, Erica L.
AU - Allen, Laura K.
AU - Jacovina, Matthew E.
AU - McNamara, Danielle
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported in part by the Institute for Educational Sciences (IES R305G020018-02 , R305G040046 , R305A080589 , R305A130124 ) and National Science Foundation (NSF REC0241144 , IIS-0735682 ). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the IES or NSF. We are particularly grateful to the many members of the SoLET Lab who have contributed to the completion of this study and this project.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2014 Elsevier Ltd.
PY - 2015/3
Y1 - 2015/3
N2 - When students exhibit control and employ a strategic plan of action over a situation they are said to be demonstrating agency (Bandura, 2001). The current work is comprised of two studies designed to investigate how agency manifests within students' choice patterns and ultimately influences self-explanation quality within the game-based system iSTART-2. In Study 1, 75 college students interacted freely within iSTART-2 for 2 h. Random walk and Entropy analyses were used to quantify the amount of control demonstrated in students' choice patterns, as well as to determine the relation between variations in these patterns and self-explanation performance within iSTART-2. Overall, students who demonstrated more controlled choice patterns generated higher quality self-explanations compared to students who exhibited more disordered choice patterns. This link between performance and controlled choice patterns is hypothesized to be driven, in part, by students' experiences of agency. That is, engaging in controlled patterns should be advantageous only when doing so is a result of students' strategic planning. In Study 2, this hypothesis was tested by assigning 70 students to a choice pattern (i.e., controlled or disordered) that had been yoked to students from Study 1, thus removing students' ability to exert agency over the iSTART-2 system. Results revealed no differences in self-explanation quality between the groups assigned to controlled and disordered choice patterns. Collectively, findings from these studies support the notion that success within game-based systems is related to students' ability to exert agency over their learning paths.
AB - When students exhibit control and employ a strategic plan of action over a situation they are said to be demonstrating agency (Bandura, 2001). The current work is comprised of two studies designed to investigate how agency manifests within students' choice patterns and ultimately influences self-explanation quality within the game-based system iSTART-2. In Study 1, 75 college students interacted freely within iSTART-2 for 2 h. Random walk and Entropy analyses were used to quantify the amount of control demonstrated in students' choice patterns, as well as to determine the relation between variations in these patterns and self-explanation performance within iSTART-2. Overall, students who demonstrated more controlled choice patterns generated higher quality self-explanations compared to students who exhibited more disordered choice patterns. This link between performance and controlled choice patterns is hypothesized to be driven, in part, by students' experiences of agency. That is, engaging in controlled patterns should be advantageous only when doing so is a result of students' strategic planning. In Study 2, this hypothesis was tested by assigning 70 students to a choice pattern (i.e., controlled or disordered) that had been yoked to students from Study 1, thus removing students' ability to exert agency over the iSTART-2 system. Results revealed no differences in self-explanation quality between the groups assigned to controlled and disordered choice patterns. Collectively, findings from these studies support the notion that success within game-based systems is related to students' ability to exert agency over their learning paths.
KW - Adaptive environments
KW - Agency
KW - Entropy
KW - Game-based learning
KW - Stealth assessment
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84919921935&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84919921935&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.compedu.2014.12.011
DO - 10.1016/j.compedu.2014.12.011
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84919921935
SN - 0360-1315
VL - 82
SP - 378
EP - 392
JO - Computers and Education
JF - Computers and Education
ER -