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Structures in Online Discussion Forums: Promoting Inclusion or Exclusion?

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Artificial Intelligence in Education. Posters and Late Breaking Results, Workshops and Tutorials, Industry and Innovation Tracks, Practitioners, Doctoral Consortium and Blue Sky (AIED 2023)

Part of the book series: Communications in Computer and Information Science ((CCIS,volume 1831))

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Abstract

While race and gender academic disparities have often been categorized via differences in final grade performance, the day-to-day experiences of minoritized student populations may not be accounted for when only concentrating on final grade outcomes. However, more fine-grained information on student behavior analyzed using AI and machine learning techniques may help to highlight the differences in day-to-day experiences. This study explores how linguistic features related to exclusion and social dynamics vary across discussion forum structures and how the variation depends on race and gender. We applied linear mixed-effect analysis to discussion posts across six semesters to investigate the effect of discussion forum structure, race, and gender on linguistic features. These results can be used to suggest design changes to instructors’ online discussion forums that will support students in feeling included.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cornell University, Ithaca, USA

    Kimberly Williamson & René F. Kizilcec

Authors
  1. Kimberly Williamson
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  2. René F. Kizilcec
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Kimberly Williamson .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Ning Wang

  2. University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada

    Genaro Rebolledo-Mendez

  3. University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

    Vania Dimitrova

  4. North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA

    Noboru Matsuda

  5. UNED, Madrid, Spain

    Olga C. Santos

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Williamson, K., Kizilcec, R.F. (2023). Structures in Online Discussion Forums: Promoting Inclusion or Exclusion?. In: Wang, N., Rebolledo-Mendez, G., Dimitrova, V., Matsuda, N., Santos, O.C. (eds) Artificial Intelligence in Education. Posters and Late Breaking Results, Workshops and Tutorials, Industry and Innovation Tracks, Practitioners, Doctoral Consortium and Blue Sky. AIED 2023. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 1831. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-36336-8_18

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-36336-8_18

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-36335-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-36336-8

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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