Epistemic processing when adolescents read online: A verbal protocol analysis of more and less successful online readers

Abstract

This study examines how the beliefs that adolescent readers hold about knowledge and knowing are activated during online reading. The research questions center on the pattern of these readers’ epistemic processes through which more or less productive learning occurs. High school students performed a critical online reading task on a controversial topic; 10 more successful readers and 10 less successful readers were then selected based on their topic knowledge gain and the quality of the questions that they constructed in response to their online reading. The epistemic processes of these two groups’ 20 readers were inferred from their concurrent verbal reports. Verbal reports were coded and classified qualitatively until concrete types of epistemic processing were recognized; the coded data were then quantified for statistical group comparisons to identify and interpret emerging patterns. The results indicated that more successful online readers tended to engage in higher order epistemic processes when judging information sources, monitoring their knowing processes, and regulating their alternative knowledge-seeking actions, whereas the epistemic actions of their less successful counterparts were more often disconnected and tended to function at a surface level. Cross-categorical associations were found among epistemic judgment, monitoring, and regulation, suggesting that epistemic processes operate interactively. Implications of the study's results are discussed in relation to literacy research and practice.