Instructional Support for Computer-Mediated Collaboration

Abstract

Support for collaboration in a computer-mediated setting was provided by instructionally promoting relevant collaborative competences. The two instructional measures investigated — learning by observing a worked-out collaboration example and learning from a scripted collaboration — were designed on the basis of a thorough analysis of what characterizes a good collaboration in the given scenario. To evaluate their effectiveness, an experiment was conducted. Not only the outcome of a subsequent collaboration and a posttest, but also the collaborative process itself were analyzed as dependent variables. The results give evidence of the potential of the two measures to promote collaborative competences. Compared to two control conditions, participants subsequently show a more sensible collaboration and achieve better results. This paper focuses on the results gained from process analyses of log-file data.