The role of students' epistemic beliefs for their argumentation performance in higher education

Students' argumentation performance can be influenced by their epistemic beliefs, however, in the context of argumentative essay writing and argumentative peer feedback in online setting this has not been clearly investigated. This study explores relationship between students' epistemic beliefs and argumentation performance regarding essay writing and peer feedback. In total, 101 undergraduate students filled out the epistemic beliefs survey and wrote an argumentative essay. Then, they provided two sets of feedback on the essays of their peers and finally submitted their revised essays. Students' beliefs about the Internet-specific justification of knowledge did not play a significant role in their argumentation performance in essay writing, while it was related to their constructive peer feedback performance. Students' beliefs about the nature of scientific knowledge were significantly related to their argumentative essay writing and peer feedback performance. In terms of uptake of peer feedback, no significant role was found for epistemic beliefs.

Automated summary

This study investigates the relationship between students' epistemic beliefs and argumentation performance in the context of essay writing and peer feedback. It finds that students' beliefs about the nature of scientific knowledge significantly influence their performance in these tasks, while beliefs about Internet-specific justification of knowledge are not as important. Epistemic beliefs do not play a significant role in the uptake of peer feedback.