The goal of this research was to discover how social presence develops in asynchronous text-based on-line learning communities and what is the effect on learning in such environments?. The aim was to gain a better knowledge of social presence in online learning contexts and fill some of the gaps in existing social presence research. The work consisted of three empirical studies, one preliminary study and a main study that consisted of two separate parts.
The preliminary study was based on questionnaires and was used to scope the problem. For the main study 1296 online conferencing messages from two different cohorts were examined. Each individual message was analysed using a social presence template. The second part of the main study applied various statistical techniques to the results from 128 students to look for correlations between social presence as measured by the template and specific learning outcomes.
This research some of the gaps in existing social presence research, Firstly it was a longitudinal study that covered two complete four-module courses, each of which ran over a 48 week period. Secondly it provided a tool for the measurement social presence that was specifically tailored to on-line education. Finally, it provided a methodological framework with which other researchers could continue this work.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| A.N. Ubon and C. Kimble. | Exploring Social Presence in Asynchronous Text-Based Online Learning Communities (OLCS). Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Information Communication Technologies in Education, (July 2004), Samos, Greece, 2004. | ISBN: |
DOI: |
Citations |
| A.N. Ubon and C. Kimble. | Supporting the Creation of Social Presence in Online Learning Communities Using Asynchronous Text-Based CMC. Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Technology in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, (July 2003), Heidelberg, Germany, 2003, pp. 295 - 300. | ISBN: |
DOI: |
Citations |
| A.N. Ubon and C. Kimble. | Knowledge Management in Online Distance Education. Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference Networked Learning 2002, (March 2002), Sheffield, UK, 2002. | ISBN: 0902831410 |
DOI: |
Citations |
Adisorn has now returned to work in the Department of Information Technology, Dhurakij Pundit University in Bangkok.