Dr. Harland’s Hangout

I worked on my dissertation from 2003-2005, and was so sick of it, I thought I’d never want to talk about it again. I remember someone telling me that the dissertation process is unique because you have to get excited about such a specific, specialized topic, that MAYBE 5 other people actually care about your results. So you can imagine my excitement, when I got a check from UMI letting me know that several individuals purchased pdf copies and one person bought a soft-bound copy! Wow–am I famous yet?

My dissertation title is “Relationship of Myers-Briggs Personality Types and Learner Participation in Face-to-Face and Asynchronous Classroom Discussions.”

For the rest of the individuals who may care about the study, here is the abstract:

This quantitative/qualitative study used the Myers-Briggs Personality Type Indicator (MBTI) and Bloom’s Taxonomy to see whether students of specific personality types perceive and actually participate differently in face-to-face (f2f) and online discussions. The study also compared how participants viewed sense of classroom community in the two learning environments. Surveys and event recordings of f2f and asynchronous online discussions were used to gather data regarding student participation in courses within an associate business degree program.

The results demonstrated that feeling types preferred to answer difficult questions f2f, while thinking types prefered to answer these questions online. Differences were also noted between the perceiving/judging, sensing/intuitive, and extraversion/introversion dichotomies. No certain MBTI type was more likely to answer questions at the analysis, synthesis and evaluation levels, respond to peers more frequently, or initiate new topics of discussion more frequently in f2f or online discussions. Neither did certain MBTI types perceive classroom community significantly differently f2f versus online. However, significant differences were found between the extraversion/introversion dichotomy in their actual participation and in how they perceived sense of community.

A comparison of data from students who were both a part of the survey and observational groups showed that the perception that most MBTI personality types had of their classroom participation matched their actual participation. The exception to this was the extraversion/introversion dichotomy in regards to peer-peer interaction and initiating new topics.