In the last couple of years, feedback research has shifted towards a feedback-as-process approach, taking a learner-centered perspective and focusing on the proactive role of the learner in feedback effectiveness. Process measures can provide new insights into the role of the learner by making learners’ actual behavioral engagement visible. We conducted an experimental study, comparing two groups (feedback vs. no feedback) of English-as-a-foreign-language learners in lower secondary schools (N = 189). The learners completed a writing task and revised it with or without feedback. A second writing task served as a transfer task. Performance was automatically assessed using a scoring algorithm. To determine the level of learners’ behavioral engagement during the text revision, we used the revision time and the edit distance (i.e., a similarity measure) as behavioral measures. Our analyses showed a positive effect of feedback on text revision. We found a full mediation of the effect of feedback on text revision through revision time with an estimated portion of mediation (POM) of .63∗∗∗ and a partial mediation of the feedback effect on text revision through the edit distance with a POM of .30∗∗. We did not find significant mediation effects of either engagement variable regarding performance in a transfer task. Our findings contribute to the understanding of feedback effectiveness, highlighting the central role of learner engagement in the feedback process.

中文翻译：

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了解自动反馈的有效性：使用流程数据揭示行为参与的作用


在过去的几年里，反馈研究已经转向反馈即过程方法，采取以学习者为中心的视角，并关注学习者在反馈有效性中的积极作用。流程度量可以通过使学习者的实际行为参与可见，从而提供对学习者角色的新见解。我们进行了一项实验研究，比较了初中英语作为外语学习者的两组（反馈与无反馈）（N = 189）。学习者完成了一项写作任务，并在有或没有反馈的情况下对其进行了修改。第二个写入任务用作转移任务。使用评分算法自动评估性能。为了确定学习者在文本修订期间的行为参与水平，我们使用了修订时间和编辑距离（即相似性度量）作为行为度量。我们的分析表明，反馈对文本修订有积极影响。我们发现，通过修订时间，反馈对文本修订的影响进行了完全中介，估计中介部分 （POM） 为 .63∗∗∗而通过编辑距离，反馈对文本修订的影响部分中介，POM 为 .30∗∗。我们没有发现任何一个参与变量对转移任务表现的显著中介效应。我们的研究结果有助于理解反馈的有效性，突出了学习者参与在反馈过程中的核心作用。