Bias, the Brain, and Student Evaluations of Teaching

Merritt, Deborah Jones

doi:10.2139/ssrn.963196

Cited by 47 publications

(61 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…The development of the Doctor Fox Studies (1976) that focused on the evaluation of teaching by students, revealed that the attractiveness of the teacher is in connection with expressiveness and without detriment to the quality of the cognitive content of teaching. It was observed that the more the teacher attracts the students' attention with his physical appearance and presentation of the lesson the more they enjoy the lesson and learn it easily, even if it contains a lot of difficult concepts (Merritt, 2008). From this point begins the systematic study of issues of non-verbal communicative behavior, such as: Research on elements of multiculturalism.…”

Section: The Framework Of Research In the Field Of Non-verbal Communimentioning

confidence: 99%

The introduction of non-verbal communication in Greek education: a literature review

Stamatis

2018

EJREP

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Section: The Framework Of Research In the Field Of Non-verbal Communimentioning

confidence: 99%

The introduction of non-verbal communication in Greek education: a literature review

Stamatis

2018

EJREP

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“…In this study students regularly rated the male professor higher than the female, and attributed the males' superior teaching skill to academic qualities; while attributing the female's skill to her attractiveness (Kaschak, 2006). Several years later in a comprehensive review of the literature Merritt (2008) found numerous studies that suggest STEs reflect student biases based on professor gender. Such studies date back to the 1970's and repeatedly report that gender, as well as a host of gender specific nonverbal actions (completely unrelated to teaching effectiveness) have been found to affect scores on STEs more than knowledge-based actions such as what the professor writes on the board.…”

Section: Professor Gendermentioning

confidence: 99%

“…effectiveness, and a major indicator in personnel decisions (Backer (2012). Such policies she notes encourages grade inflation, and leads to dumbing down of course material (Backer, 2012;Merritt, 2008;Wilson, 1998). Other studies find faculty indeed are subtlety encouraged to'dumb down' the material in an attempt to raise the overall course grades (Filetti, et.…”

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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“…It is necessary to evaluate the teaching level of young teachers from various aspects in order to promote the young teachers in colleges and universities as well as the overall improvement of teaching level. More results on this topic can be found in the following references: Marks (2012), Merritt (2008), McPherson et al (2009), Rahman (2006, Spooren et al (2007), Weinberg et al (2009) and. In this paper, by the sample of the final results of the first young college teachers' teaching competition in Jiangxi Province in 2014, we give a comprehensive teaching quality evaluation for the composition of participating subjects, titles, and the final results.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Evaluation of Teaching Level and Exploration of Improving Ability for Young Teachers in Higher Education

Liu¹,

Mei²,

Hu³

et al. 2015

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By analyzing the final results sample of teaching competition of the first young college teachers in Jiangxi Province in 2014, we give a comprehensive evaluation for the subject composition and the title of young teachers in higher education, which can provide a reference and basis for the university managers to adopt more scientific teaching methods and means to improve the quality of higher education. Meanwhile, for the lack of teaching experiences' young teachers, we bring out effective ways to improve the teaching level from curriculum, instructional design, classroom teaching and teaching reflection.

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Bias, the Brain, and Student Evaluations of Teaching

Cited by 47 publications

References 13 publications

The introduction of non-verbal communication in Greek education: a literature review

The introduction of non-verbal communication in Greek education: a literature review

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

The Evaluation of Teaching Level and Exploration of Improving Ability for Young Teachers in Higher Education

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