Self-Assessments: What Are Their Valid Uses?

Abstract

A major contribution of the article, "Self Assess ment of Knowledge: A Cognitive Learning or Af fective Measure?," is that it provides empirical evidence supporting something that many fac ulty members have already anecdotally ob served through classroom instruction. Student self-assessments or student self-reports on learn ing outcomes are only moderate predictors of cog nitive learning. Cognitive learning refers to the direct measurement of factual or skill-based knowledge. Furthermore, although not measured by Sitzmann et al. but well referenced is that weaker students are more likely to over-predict their abilities. From an instructional and research perspective, this indicates that when used in iso lation self-assessments provide limited informa tion with respect to cognitive learning. Self-assessments are found in Sitzmann, Ely, Brown, and Bauer's study to be strong predictors of learners' motivations and satisfaction and a moderate predictor of self-efficacy. The authors' operational definition for each term is as follows: Satisfaction is measured through learners' re ported reactions to the learning experience and is reported under the variable name "reactions." Motivation is measured through the extent to which learners strive to use the knowledge they have acquired. Self-assessments are also found to be moderately correlated with self-efficacy, or the learners' confidence in performing the trained learning task. In this investigation, self assessments were found to be better predictors of the affective measures of reactions and motivations than of cognitive learning or self-efficacy. To many college professors, these results with respect to cognitive learning will be "intuitively obvious" (borrowing terminology from mathe matics). However, as the readers progress, they will learn that approximately one third of the authors of the reviewed articles treated self assessment as a measure of cognitive learning. I could not help but think to myself, "Yes, of course." Even as we agree with the conclusions (self-assessment is not a strong predictor of cog nitive learning), we can readily think of articles that argue the strength of their approach to im proving student learning, based solely on self report, and many of these articles have been peer reviewed and published. What is obvious in the classroom is not obvious in the research. Almost