The Sequential Analysis of Collaborative Writing and Editing Processes in Wikis

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to sequentially analyze and identify collaborative writing processes used to increase or decrease the quality of students' written arguments. The study's participants were 16 graduate students enrolled in an online course on inquiry and measurement. Every student worked on one team to analyze the arguments for using surveys and worked on one team to analyze arguments for using interview. A total of seven teams worked on the survey arguments; seven teams worked on the interview arguments. Each student worked with their team members using their team's own wiki to analyze and develop each argument for using surveys and interviews. The arguments produced by the students were scored by the researcher and a second coder to determine which processes performed by the consenting students produced the highest- and lowest-quality arguments. Results indicated that the collaborative writing process used by students working in teams to develop a high-quality argument in a wiki consisted of six action sequence patterns while teams producing a low-quality argument consisted of only two action sequence patterns. Given that the low-quality argument action sequences were also not observed in the processes used to produce the high-quality arguments, it is possible that these two action sequences have hindered or obstructed the processes needed to produce high-quality arguments. The findings indicate that specific action sequences and more structured collaborative writing processes may help to produce high-quality arguments. As a result, interventions should be directed at increasing the frequency of the action sequences found in this study to produce high-quality arguments which may assist students in writing higher quality arguments.