New technologies transform research specialties and potentiate new fields. Sociometers--wearable electronic sensors collecting quantitative, dynamic data about embodied social interactions at hyperfine scales--represent such a possibility for small group research. This article introduces this new method and its distinctive qualities and…

Anecdotal evidence suggests that participants in conversation can sometimes act as a coalition. This implies a level of conversational organization in which groups of individuals form a coherent unit. This paper investigates the implications of this phenomenon for psycholinguistic and semantic models of shared context in dialog. We present a…

Though class participation and group cohesion have shown some potential to promote student performance in conventional classrooms, their efficacy has not yet been demonstrated in an online-class setting. Group cohesion, defined as member attraction to and self-identification with a group, is thought to promote positive interdependence and the…

Online discussion is a commonly used means to promote student understanding of a topic and to facilitate social interaction among students or between students and instructor; however, its effects on student learning in online learning environments have rarely been investigated. The purpose of this study was to examine the role of online discussion…

A synchronous blend of online learning and "face-to-face" teaching is becoming a feasible instructional approach in higher education with the advent of technology. Although this learning mode is not new in higher education, little research has been done to contextualise social presence experiences in which effects of interactions were…

The study buddy is a learning strategy employed in a graduate distance course to promote informal peer reviewing of assignments before submission. This strategy promotes student-student interaction and helps break the social isolation of distance learning. Given the concern by Arum and Roksa (2011) that student-student interaction may be…

Students who feel like part of a classroom community gain more enjoyment and are more academically successful than students who do not feel similar levels of community. This study intended to determine if students in online courses perceive the same level of community as students in face-to-face classes and if outside factors impacted community…