Generalizations 2# Broegaard, R. B. (2018)

 At the current stage this project is about finding statistical generalizations in qualitative, danish educational research. That is to check my assumption that there is a tendency to make statistical generalizations on the basis of observations which cannot support such generalizations.

I will be posting excerpts from all those studies which to me seem problematic. This post is part of that and this is a link to the first post in the line.

The study

Reference:

Broegaard, R. B. (2018). PhD supervision strategies in a cross-cultural setting: Enriching learning opportunities. Dansk Universitetspædagogisk Tidsskrift, 13(25), 18–36. https://doi.org/10.7146/dut.v13i25.104330

Abstract:

"Recent research findings highlight the importance of supervisors’ feedback aimed at helping students how to learn by themselves to develop their thinking. Responding to the current focus on internationalization of universities, this article explores how PhD supervisors can help fostering critical thinking. Based on qualitative interviews with four African double degree doctoral students, as well as participant observation, the article highlights reflections regarding different supervisory strategies a PhD supervisor faces in a cross-cultural academic setting, and the importance of meta-communication in addressing them. Results showed that most of the students appreciated the more informal student-supervisor relationship, highlighted through collaborative fieldwork experiences, as well as the use of visual tools for stimulating creative and critical thinking. However, results also showed that a coaching supervision style was experienced as unclear and scary by one student, highlighting that the supervision process is a mutual learning process in need of recurrent adaptation." 

Testable hypothesis?: 

No: "In  this  setup,  what  does  helpful  feedback  look  like? And  how  can  supervisors  help  facilitate critical  thinking  in  cross-cultural  re-search collaboration?"

Method/materials:

"In addition to the individual interviews performed during four weeks of collaborative fieldwork,  I  also  draw  upon  participant  observations  in  field  research  activities,  in-cluding  daily  team  dialogues.  The  research  team  in  each  country  consisted  of  two  PhD students, two of their national supervisors, as well as two of their Danish super-visors.  Notes  were  taken  regarding  learning  processes,  interactions,  relations  and  questions  posed  by  the  PhDs  during  our  fieldwork,  and  interviews  were  recorded  and detailed notes were elaborated on this basis. Furthermore, as a backdrop for my analysis,  I  revisited  notes  from  the  entire  first  year  of  supervision  and  interaction  with the PhD students during their two-month stay in Denmark, via skype, email and during international conference participation. " s24-25

Statistical generalizations:

1) "Literature  (Brodin,  2016;  Diezmann,  2005;  Odena  &  Burgess,  2017;  Overall  et  al.,  2011;  Vehviläinen  &  Löfström,  2016),  as  well  as  the  empirical  data  for  this  assign-ment  suggest  that  supervisors  (and  students)  can  benefit  from  giving  comments  as questions, as it leaves room for students to think for themselves, explain themselves and  find  ways  forward.  However,  based  on  this  small  qualitative  study,  as  well  as  findings by Doyle et al (2018), questions should clarify what content needs more ex-planation  or  exploration,  because  students  seem  to prefer more explicit comments and clarification." s31-32

2) "Therefore, while my research to some extent supports the find-ing that the degree to which supervisors encourage students to think and act auton-omously  is  associated  with  greater  self-efficacy  in  students  (Overall,  Deane  and  Pe-terson  2011),  I  would  argue  that  the  statement  should  be  modified  to  require  that  due attention be paid to identity processes, processes of becoming (whether doctor-al  student  or  supervisor)  and  getting  both  student  and  supervisor  to  know  and  un-derstand the types of feedback and interaction that each is familiar with (Doyle et al. 2018) so that the supervisor can design an adaptive learning process. This seems to be especially relevant in cross-cultural contexts. Furthermore,  metacommunication  is  essential  for  creating  a  common  language  about  the  pedagogical  challenges  that  supervision  (also  of  international  doctoral  students)  poses,  and  how  to  overcome  them.  Encouragement  and  the  supervisor’s  awareness  about  supporting  the  students’  sense  of  agency  and  ownership,  both  through  communication  (written  and  oral)  and  through  practice,  is  also  important  (Doyle  et  al  2018;  Elliot  &  Kobayashi  2017),  especially  for  overcoming  ‘deficit  con-structions’ (Doyle & Manathunga, 2017; Goode, 2007)." s32

Comments:

I have flagged this study for generalizations of type 3 and 5 (see typology).

Both excerpts are examples of more or less implicit statistical generalizations. Every prescriptive statement about what seems to work ("...giving comments as questions...", "...encourage students to think and act autonomously...", "...metacommunication...") implies that this study empirically supports such effects of the things prescribed in future contexts. One might argue that if enough care was taken to make statements of the noted kind only in relation to the present study itself, then there would be no problem. As such the problem can be characterized as one of semantics.