Strategies for the management of lecturer stress in feedback tutorials

Abstract

The process of providing students with individual feedback on assessed work was identified as a source of lecturer stress (Stough and Emmer, 1998). An action research approach was used to address the following research question. What approaches to providing students with feedback minimize lecturer stress? Data were collected using written feedback mark-sheets and a reflective diary. Findings indicated that negative expectations, student emotion, challenges from students and lack of control were identified as lecturer stressors and that a variety of strategies gleaned from recent literature were found to be effective in minimizing lecturer stress. Although shortcomings in the methodology of the study limit the generalizability of the findings, the action research provides a useful starting point for thinking about the impact of feedback strategy on lecturer stress.