Affect Matters: When Writing Feedback Leads to Negative Feeling

Abstract

A continuous challenge in the writing classroom is maintaining openness and positivity around feedback. There are myriad factors that influence the felt experience of the feedback process, and the researchers wanted to understand better how students experience and perceive negative moments, as well as what factors remain salient in their minds after the fact. Therefore, we surveyed students nationwide who had taken a writing intensive course to learn about the moments when they were not able to take teacher feedback and use it to revise, as well as the times when they used feedback against their own judgment. Drawing on Alice Glarden Brand’s affective continuum to code the open responses qualitatively, the researchers found that students’ expressions of those negative moments often reflected hierarchy, felt disrespect, and confusion; their desire was most often for more time and space, for respect, and for clearly worded, consistent instructions.

Keywords

• Affect
• feedback
• revision
• writing instruction