Project B01

Goal

The first goal of the project is to identify conditions under which providing peer-feedback advances diagnostic and intervention reasoning skills in simulation-based learning. The second goal is to investigate the conditions under which peer-feedback skills can be advanced through simulation-based learning. The focus of promoting these skills is on the use of representational scaffolding aiming at improving the matching of peers in terms of their learning needs and performance.

Research Questions

• Under which conditions does giving peer-feedback improve diagnostic and intervention skills in simulation-based learning environments?
  

• How can professional peer-feedback skills be assessed validly in medical education?
  

• Which cognitive, meta-cognitive and social learning processes occur when learners give peer-feedback and how can we measure them?
  

• To what extent can learning prerequisites and learning processes serve as adjustment bases for adaptive representational scaffolding?
  

• How does adaptive representational scaffolding affect learning processes, diagnostic skills, and peer-feedback skills?

Methodology

B01 uses simulation-based learning environments in medical education, in which medical students provide written peer-feedback on diagnostic and intervention-related case work. Methodologically, the project B01 combines quasi-experimental and experimental studies with pre-, process-, and post-measurements to examine diagnostic and intervention skills as well as peer-feedback skills. The analyses combine quantitative and qualitative approaches, including analyses of variance, correlations and content analyses as well as machine learning algorithms for adaptive matching.

• Study 1: Quasi-experimental study to validate the model of diagnostic skills and peer-feedback skills as well as investigate the effects of expertise levels on cognitive, meta-cognitive and social learning processes, as well as peer-feedback and diagnostic skills, including individual learning prerequisites.
  

• Study 2: Experimental study on the effects of representational scaffolding on diagnostic and peer-feedback skills. The study examines whether learners who receive representational scaffolding (i.e. adaptive matching to simulated peer performances characterised by the salience of diagnostically relevant information, depending on individual prerequisites and prior performance) differ from a control group without adaptive matching in terms of cognitive, metacognitive and social learning processes, as well as diagnostic skills and peer feedback skills.
  

• Study 3: Quasi-experimental study to validate the model of intervention skills and peer-feedback skills and investigate the effects of expertise levels on cognitive, meta-cognitive and social learning processes, as well as intervention skills, including individual learning prerequisites.
  

• Study 4: Experimental study on the effects of representational scaffolding on intervention and peer-feedback skills. The study examines whether learners who receive representational scaffolding, that is, adaptive matching to simulated peer performances with varying salience of diagnostically relevant information, differ from a control group without adaptive matching in cognitive, metacognitive and social learning processes, as well as in intervention and peer-feedback skills.

Role Within the Collaborative Research Center

• Joint data collection, data provision, and aggregation of process data (Project M)
  

• Research data management and personalisation of the simulation (Project INF)
  

• Conceptualisation and assessment tool for peer-feedback skills (B01 and B02)
  

• Feedback design and personalisation (B01, B02, and B03)
  

• Use of meta-analytical insights on group-level learning prerequisites (B01 and B05)
  

• Analysis of feedback processes using NLP methods (B01 and B04)
  

• Identification of behavioural indicators of social learning processes (B01, B02, B03, and B05)
  

• Joint tasks and measures for intervention activities and skills (B01, B02, and A01)
  

• Alignment of case typicality (B01 and A01)
  

• Joint use of the CASUS learning platform (B01, A01, B02, and B03)
  

• Informational complexity and salience of cues for representational scaffolding (B01, A02–A05, B02, and C01–C05)
  

• Provision of simulations for higher education context (B01, A01, A03, and B06)