This study seeks to begin answering two simple questions: "What motivates our students?" and its corollary, "What prevents our students from being motivated?" The motivation-hygiene theory (F. Herzberg, "Work and the nature of man," World Publishing, Cleveland, OH, 1966), a well-tested theory from organizational psychology, holds that people's…

Theoretical perspectives on the efficacy of instructional feedback suggest that there should be significant variation in students' perceptions of and responses to feedback messages. Yet, little effort has been made to either uncover the perceptual dimensions by which students evaluate feedback, or to measure students' perceptions of feedback. The…

Many communication scholars recognize the need to regularly explore current communication curriculum and to evaluate its contribution to meeting the needs of students and the demands of the workplace. However, within the communication discipline, current curricular decisions are based on studies conducted nearly a decade ago. This study (a)…

In recent years, the research on teasing and bullying has grown dramatically and is coupled with a rise in the development of intervention programs targeted to teachers, principals, and parents. Ultimately the goal of these programs is to reduce or eliminate teasing and bullying within school settings. The aim of this project is to clarify how…

Out-of-classroom communication (OCC) in the form of email has increased considerably in the past few years. This study uses Interaction Adaptation Theory (IAT) to inform and frame the impact of using overly casual email messages with instructors. Study one used an experimental method to determine that message quality (casual vs. formal messages)…

This study examines the ways in which privacy rules are developed and boundaries are coordinated within the student-teacher relationship using Petronio's Communication Privacy Management theory as a framework. Forty-one college instructors described the specific criteria they use to develop privacy rules and the conditions under which boundaries…

This study tested two models of instructor credibility as a potential mediator of instructors' prosocial communication behaviors (e.g., confirmation, clarity, and nonverbal immediacy) and students' learning outcomes. Participants included 1,416 undergraduate students from four different institutions across the United States. Results of structural…

Four studies (N = 639) were conducted to develop and validate a global measure of student communication satisfaction with an instructor. In study one, participants were 155 students who reported on an instructor from their smallest class during the semester. Participants completed the Student Communication Satisfaction Scale (SCSS), the…

Successfully evaluating students' work challenges teachers to achieve both corrective task and identity-protection goals in interaction. This study investigated how face-threat mitigation that students received from their teachers during feedback influenced students' judgments about the quality and usefulness of the feedback their instructors…

With the goal of identifying the characteristics or traits students bring to the classroom that predispose them to panic when faced with the threat of presenting in front of an audience, this study introduced a subtype of public-speaking state anxiety--anxious arousal. Specifically, this study examined the extent to which trait anxiety and…

Research suggests that student academic support plays a vital role at the college level as students often view communication with peers as their primary source of academic support (Thompson, 2008). This research advances the Student Academic Support Scale (SASS) as a method of assessing the frequency, importance, and mode of communicating academic…

Survey data on mass communication students' perceptions of plagiarism and fabrication indicate an ethics gap in which students are more concerned about ethical breaches in journalism than in academics. Further analyses found that the ethics gap increases among students near graduation who had higher levels of concern and suggested harsher…

A growing body of research indicates that classroom justice concerns are important to students. When students perceive their instructors are not concerned about justice, they report a host of negative outcomes. Due to the importance of justice assigned to students, the present study sought to understand how instructors view justice. Results…

The researcher-Institutional Review Board (IRB) relationship is a critical element in a faculty member's role in knowledge generation and dissemination. The nature of this relationship has considerable implications for data gathering in the research process, as well as in the mentoring and instruction of graduate and undergraduate students as…

This meta-analysis reviews the findings of 51 studies (N = 14,378) examining the associations among teacher credibility, teacher behaviors, and student outcomes. When all three dimensions of credibility are considered collectively (i.e., competence, trustworthiness, and caring), the cumulative evidence indicates a moderate, meaningful relationship…