To Ask or Not to Ask? A Dynamic Systems Perspective on Help Seeking in an Introductory Statistics Classroom

Abstract

Student-generated questions are an important mechanism for learning and self-regulation, yet their scarcity in classroom discourse points to a need to understand how students decide to ask or withhold their questions. This study examined how 12 graduate students in an introductory statistics course made decisions about asking questions during whole group instruction. Help seeking decisions were framed as arising from a dynamic system of a student’s situated role identity as a class participant. Qualitative analysis of post-class interviews illustrated the highly contextual, dynamic nature of students’ decisions to ask or withhold questions. Analyses revealed an array of microdecisions that involved determining whether help was needed, anticipating social impressions, and considering impacts on others. Results revealed a prominent configuration of ontological beliefs, self-perceptions, goals, and perceived action possibilities that led students to withhold questions. The findings highlight tensions and dynamics among role identity elements, including distinct appraisals of one’s own vs. classmates’ questions. The study illuminates how context, questions, and interacting identity elements frame students’ willingness to ask questions during class.

Keywords:

• Student-generated questions
• question asking
• dynamic systems
• DSMRI
• academic help seeking
• classroom discourse
• statistics

Notes

1 In many cases, question asking can be conceptualized as a form of help seeking, though questions that arise out of curiosity—rather than difficulty or puzzlement—are not prototypical forms of help seeking. Nevertheless, many sincere information-seeking questions involves students seeking assistance from others by requesting for information.

2 To ensure anonymity of male participants only female pronouns are used in the description of the results.

3 Students could enroll in either a fully in-person or fully online version of the course. Students in the online version remotely attended class meetings via Webex or watch recorded lectures asynchronously. There were 15 students enrolled in the online version and 14 students enrolled in the in-person section. Students in the online version of the course were excluded from the current study. Two students in the in-person section declined to participate.

4 I conducted observations and interviews in the role of a researcher, who was completely independent of the course. Participants were informed at the start of the study and in the interview that responses would be kept confidential, including from the instructor. The instructor was aware of my research aims; however, she did not have access to interview data and was not informed of emergent findings during the semester in which data were collected.

5 Due to scheduling constraints, interviews with two of the participants were conducted within two days of the class meeting.

6 This total includes non-participants enrolled in the course; participants asked 89 questions. An additional 20 questions were asked during class meetings by students in the online section of the course, typically by entering the questions into a chat field.

7 While participants occasional expressed their deliberations in the form of a question, microdecisions reflect the author’s phrasing.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by funding from the Research Foundation of the City University of New York. The author thanks Jennifer Cromley, Avi Kaplan, Erin Horvat, Brian Miller, and Meghan Dunn-Davison for their helpful feedback on earlier versions of the manuscript, and thanks Melanie Bonich for her assistance in data management.