Cognitive Dissonance or Revenge? Student Grades and Course Evaluations

Maurer, Trent W.

doi:10.1207/s15328023top3303_4

Cited by 25 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 5 publications

(5 reference statements)

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“…For one, students' impresssion of teaching quality is expected to increase when students learn more, and grades are an indicator of learning. A second explanation is focused on grading leniency: if students receive lower grades for a given amount of learning, they rate the course less favorably (Marks 2000;McPherson and Jewell 2007), consistent with cognitive dissonance theories (Maurer 2006). Lastly, such achievement levels may reflect pre-existing differences between students (Marsh 2007).…”

Section: Evaluation Equationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Measuring teaching quality in higher education: assessing selection bias in course evaluations

2016

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Student evaluations of teaching (SETs) are widely used to measure teaching quality in higher education and compare it across different courses, teachers, departments and institutions. Indeed, SETs are of increasing importance for teacher promotion decisions, student course selection, as well as for auditing practices demonstrating institutional performance. However, survey response is typically low, rendering these uses unwarranted if students who respond to the evaluation are not randomly selected along observed and unobserved dimensions. This paper is the first to fully quantify this problem by analyzing the direction and size of selection bias resulting from both observed and unobserved characteristics for over 3000 courses taught in a large European university. We find that course evaluations are upward biased, and that correcting for selection bias has nonnegligible effects on the average evaluation score and on the evaluation-based ranking of courses. Moreover, this bias mostly derives from selection on unobserved characteristics, implying that correcting evaluation scores for observed factors such as student grades does not solve the problem. However, we find that adjusting for selection only has small impacts on the measured effects of observables on SETs, validating a large related literature which considers the observable determinants of evaluation scores without correcting for selection bias.

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Section: Evaluation Equationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Measuring teaching quality in higher education: assessing selection bias in course evaluations

2016

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“…Students also perceived the course to be less difficult, despite the fact that it was not objectively any different between the conditions. Similarly, likely because grades were higher (Franklin, 2001;Ginexi, 2003;Heckert et al, 2006;Maurer, 2006;Salmons, 1993), students in the IF-AT condition rated the instructor more favorably than students in the Scantron condition. Other instructor items that had nothing to do with assessment type (i.e., instructor preparation, clarity of presentation of the material, instructor helpfulness) also showed an increase, suggesting a possible halo effect.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Additionally, the large existing body of research on course evaluations has repeatedly documented a significant relationship between students' expected course grades and student ratings (Franklin, 2001;Ginexi, 2003;Heckert, Latier, Ringwald, & Silvey, 2006), and there is some evidence that this relationship is causal (Maurer, 2006;Salmons, 1993), so the use of IF-AT forms with partial credit IR could significantly affect course evaluations. Further, as Titus (2008) notes, "some researchers have found student ratings to have unintended negative effects on educational quality through decreasing faculty morale and inducing lowered academic standards and grade inflation (Greenwald and Gillmore 1997a;V.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of the Immediate Feedback Assessment Technique on Course Evaluations

Maurer

Kropp

2015

Teaching & Learning Inquiry: The ISSOTL Journal

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This project reports the results of two studies that investigated the impact on course evaluations of using partial credit iterative responding (PCIR) with the Results from Study 2 revealed no difference in course evaluations between conditions. Students earned roughly 40% of the partial credit available through PCIR, resulting in a 4 to 8% increase in their quiz scores, depending on the PCIR scheme.

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“…Indeed several studies suggest students who are more engaged are likely to both earn higher grades and rate professors more favorably (Culver, 2010). Still other researchers suggest that the correlation between course grades and STEs might be explained by cognitive dissonance theory; suggesting students expecting poor marks in a course will rate professors poorly to minimize ego threats (Maurer, 2006). effectiveness, and a major indicator in personnel decisions (Backer (2012).…”

Section: Course Gradesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Tail Wagging the Dog; An Overdue Examination of Student Teaching Evaluations

Miles

House

2015

IJHE

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Purpose: The purpose of this research is to examine the impact of several factors beyond the professor's control and their unique impact on Student Teaching Evaluations (STEs). The present research pulls together a substantial amount of data to statistically analyze several academic historical legends about just how vulnerable STEs are to the effects of: class size, course type, professor gender, and course grades.Design/methodology/approach: This research is utilizes over 30,000 individual student evaluations of 255 professors, spanning six semesters, during a three year time period to test six hypotheses. The final sample represents 1057 classes ranging in size between 10 and 190 students. Each hypothesis is statistically analyzed, with either analysis of variance or a Regression model. Findings:This study finds support for 5 out of 6 hypotheses. Specifically, these data suggest STEs are likely to be closest to "5" (using a 1-5 scale with 5 being highest) in small elective classes, and lowest in large required classes taught by females. As well we find support for the notion that higher expected course grades may lead to higher STEs. Practical implications:The practical significance of this research is important. First this research utilized a large data set spanning several years and hundreds of professors and thousands of students and rigorous statistical analysis to assert several important findings. Indeed STEs are impacted significantly by class type, class size, the gender of the professor and the expected course grade. With these findings we suggest a more comprehensive mechanism is in order for evaluation of teaching effectiveness. Social implications:This research could have great social implications if widely read across academic circles. Indeed the tail is wagging the dog; or the student is influencing teaching across America's universities. It is time to examine teaching effectiveness through a different lens, because using teaching evaluations to determine promotion and tenure, sparse bonus allocation, and teaching awards may be short sighted. Research limitations:While this research is statistically accurate, it is limited by the notion that the data was collected from one large area. As such, care should be taken in generalizing these results to other areas that may have different demographic composition, funding etc. Originality/value:To the best of the authors' knowledge this research is the first of its kind to statistically analyze such a large body of data and provide a useful guide to help evaluate professors utilizing what information is available.

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Cognitive Dissonance or Revenge? Student Grades and Course Evaluations

Cited by 25 publications

References 5 publications

Measuring teaching quality in higher education: assessing selection bias in course evaluations

Measuring teaching quality in higher education: assessing selection bias in course evaluations

The Impact of the Immediate Feedback Assessment Technique on Course Evaluations

The Tail Wagging the Dog; An Overdue Examination of Student Teaching Evaluations

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