Improving instructional explanations in netbased communication between experts and laypersons

Inasmuch as knowledge becomes ever more specialized and complex, individuals often lack the expertise necessary for making a decision or solving a problem on their own. Thus, in many situations, laypersons are reliant on expert advice. The proliferation of the Internet offers new possibilities for laypersons to enlist the assistance of experts. Not only can laypersons retrieve expert information publicly available from the World Wide Web but they can also obtain personal advice from experts in a one-to-one fashion. In order to communicate with laypersons effectively, experts must form a mental model about their communication partner's knowledge on the basis of which they can customise their explanations accordingly. In computer-mediated communication, however, fewer channels of communication are available and feedback is more restricted. In addition, due to their rich knowledge base, experts often have difficulty considering the layperson's completely different perspective adequately. Against this background, a support procedure was developed that helps computer experts to adapt their explanations specifically to the layperson's knowledge prerequisites. The support method consists of a small Internet-based questionnaire by which laypersons who place a technical support inquiry to an online support are asked to provide several self-assessments of their computer expertise. Thus, the information provided to the experts can be used to construct a relatively detailed mental model about the layperson's individual knowledge state. To empirically test the effectiveness of the support procedure for communication, three dialogue experiments were conducted. In all studies, the following experimental setting was used: Experts and laypersons sat in separate rooms and communicated with each other via an asynchronous interface. The experts' task was to provide explanations to laypersons' inquiries regarding diverse computer and Internet issues. In the experiments, the availability of the support procedure as well as the validity of the information about the laypersons' knowledge presented to the experts were experimentally varied. Dependent variables encompassed laypersons' learning from the experts' explanations as well as the number of questions laypersons directed to the experts. Overall, results showed that the support procedure led to an improved communication between experts and laypersons. Laypersons were better able to process the experts' explanations that were produced with the support procedure within the frame of their personal understanding, as was indicated by higher learning gains and a reduced need for asking follow-up questions. Experiment 1 showed that the improved communication could be attributed to the experts' ability to specifically adapt their explanations to the layperson's individual knowledge state. Experiment 2 revealed the detrimental effects on communicative effectiveness and efficiency, when experts had a flawed mental model about the layperson's knowledge. Finally, experiment 3 identified the adaptation strategies experts applied in order to produce explanations that were optimal for laypersons with different knowledge backgrounds.

Author dc:creator

• Wittwer, Jörg

Contributors dc:contributor

• Renkl, Alexander

• Theorie des Common Ground
• Adaptivität
• computerbasierte Kommunikation
• theory of common ground
• adaptivity
• computerbased communication

Repository record source_url

https://freidok.uni-freiburg.de/data/2089

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:freidok.uni-freiburg.de:2089