Ellis, R A et al --- "Referencing as evidence of student scholarliness and academic readiness" [2009] LegEdDig 21; (2009) 17(2) Legal Education Digest 19

• Referencing as evidence of student scholarliness and academic readiness

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Referencing as evidence of student scholarliness and academic readiness

R O Ellis, M Freeman & A Bell

13 (1) Aust & NZ J Law & Ed, 2008, pp 83-98

A knowledge of how to approach referencing appropriately in university essays focusing on legal issues does not simply arise from understanding academic or legal concepts, rather it is a combination of the two. Given the difficulties associated with this key aspect of the education of law students, some evidence of how and why students experience referencing in their essays is necessary if we are to help them deal with their academic and legal responsibilities appropriately.

Research directly focusing on the student experience of referencing has focused on a variety of issues. Some studies are more pragmatically orientated, seeking to identify why students do not reference more and under which circumstances students will provide more references. Read, Francis and Robson investigated the learning experience of 45 final-year students and found that only around 18 per cent of the students were aware that the arguments they were putting forward in their essays needed to be underpinned by evidence from other sources. Robinson and Schlegl found that teacher instruction together with a requirement to include a minimum number of scholarly sources (or receive an academic penalty), was related to increasing the number of scholarly citations in student essays, compared to instruction only.

A potential area of confusion for students regarding referencing is the use of internet resources. Conventions of how to select and reference appropriate sources are only starting to become well-known across all disciplines. It is clear that students want more guidance from their teachers about how to search internet resources productively and how to evaluate sources critically. Not surprisingly, teachers expressed doubts about students’ ability to evaluate the quality of internet sources without teacher guidance.

Finally, relatively recent research into the legal status of the relationship between students and universities offers a context in which to consider the implications of academic misconduct arising from plagiarism. A recent study has raised the issue of the importance of universities putting students in a position of full information of their academic and legal responsibilities as students. This is particularly important for law students who, if found guilty of academic misconduct, might be refused admission into their profession. To better understand how to support students to approach referencing appropriately in their studies, evidence-based research is required about how and why students reference. This study addresses some of the fundamental aspects of the experience of referencing by university students that can be used to help shape our understanding of how to support students.

For the purposes of this study, student scholarliness is defined as willingness by students to engage in research for tasks such as essays in ways that facilitate critical evaluation, synthesis and comprehension.

The analysis of data in this study is informed by a view of learning referred to a phenomenography. Phenomenography adopts the position that any phenomenon can be divided into structural and referential aspects; that is, the parts that give its form and the aspects that give its meaning. In terms of student learning in higher education, key parts of the student experience have proven to be what students say they think they are learning (their conceptions) and how they approach their learning (their approaches). A feature of the phenomenographic model is its recursive nature.

Students in a first-year undergraduate business degree in a metropolitan Australian university were required to study a law course. The purpose of the course was to provide the students with an overview of the Australian legal system (sources of law, parliament, courts, doctrine of precedent), including an examination of those provisions in the Commonwealth Constitution relevant to business and commercial activities. A key part of their assessment in the course was the completion of a research essay about contract law. The essay question and instructions were: ‘Examine, with appropriate reference to court decisions and secondary source materials, the following: To what extent (and how) are the ordinary rules of contract law applied differently to employment contracts’. The teachers on this course gave all students the same tuition about the importance and purpose of referencing, including the standards which students were supposed to follow for cases, statutes and texts

Semi-structured interviews and open-ended questionnaires were used to investigate the student experience of referencing in their law essay. Twelve students took part in interviews and 215 students completed the questionnaires, representing 26 per cent of the population of 800 enrolled students. The sample included 130 females and 85 males, with a mean age of 21 years.

The interviews and questionnaires were designed to complement each other for the purpose of the investigation. The purpose of the questionnaires was to investigate the distribution of the key issues over a larger population sample. For these reasons, the same key research questions were used in the design of the interviews and questionnaires: (1) What is the purpose of referencing in essays? (student conceptions); (2) From the time you begin researching/preparing for your essay, how do you approach referencing? What do you do and why? (student approaches).

The researchers adopted an iterative process of analysis of the transcripts, during which diverse categories of ways of thinking (conceptions) and ways of doing (approaches) referencing became more distinct. In the first iteration, key themes of approaches to referencing were identified, both from the point of view of the literature and the experience of the researchers. Key themes were grouped into logically related categories and illuminative quotations from the questionnaires were selected to start to identify the real meaning of the groupings. Further discussion and debate ensued as the researchers situated the categories of responses in relation to one another. This led to the development of a draft set of categories. Two of the researchers then used the draft set of categories to classify the remaining transcripts. The categorisation process drew on the SOLO taxonomy to help structure the hierarchies of the final categories.

Analysis of the student responses identified qualitatively different categories of ways the students reported thinking about referencing: two which were related to higher level conceptions of learning such as reflection and reasoning, and two which were comparatively poorer in conceptualisation.

Category A: Referencing as a way of developing scholarliness through reflection and synthesis. Student responses in this category tended to exhibit a significant awareness of the underlying research-based processes that accompanied referencing. In this category, the conception of referencing is related to aspects of learning and scholarliness. The experience of referencing is conceptualised as related to wide reading in order to learn, making distinctions between original thought and ideas developed upon others’, gaining weight behind the arguments being made through multiple referencing, and enabling others to assess one’s own development of knowledge and understanding. There is a recognition that prior knowledge exists which can be helpful in the structuring of writing and learning processes, but that it is a basis upon which to develop individual ideas and arguments, not an end in itself achieved by collecting and listing the arguments of others. Consequently, the integration of ideas from many sources, well- referenced for easy identification of source, is a key aspect of this category.

Category B: Referencing as a way of validating reasoning. Extracts from interviews grouped in this category show an awareness that there is usually a pre-existing body of research upon which students can draw in order to formulate their arguments for their essay. There is a conscious effort to attribute ideas to the work of others, especially in order to make the case being put forward stronger. The difference between this and the previous category is an awareness of the scope of the context underlying the conception. In this category, the context tends to focus more on the essay task itself. The previous category revealed an awareness of a wider context, such as the course or future, something beyond the task itself.

Category C: Referencing as a way of complying with instructions. Category C does not reveal an awareness of experiences of learning that can arise out of the process of finding and integrating references into an essay. It involves some vagueness about the real meaning of referencing, linking it more to following what the teacher has instructed than for developing a real understanding of the ideas being discussed and the crafting of an argument. Some aspects of this category tend towards worrying about aspects of plagiarism, although a real focus on plagiarism is the focus of the next category.

Category D: Referencing as a way of avoiding plagiarism. Category D reveals extracts which show concern predominately about plagiarism. The interview transcripts classified in this category did not reveal an awareness of the more prospective benefits of referencing, such as reflection, learning and the elaboration of arguments with support from other writers. Instead, they were limited to a type of policing conception of referencing, where the main purpose was to ensure that ideas were not taken from another writer. The focus seems to be on ideas such as ‘ownership’ and ‘checking’ rather than ideas such as positioning an argument and providing persuasive points of view.

The second research question focused on the way students approached referencing. Approaches are very different to conceptions. They involve strategies, the way students do things, and intentions, the reasons why students do those things. In contrast, conceptions are categorised from the way students talk about the way they think about something. The results in this section show qualitatively different groups of approaches, some orientated to the development of an argument, and some orientated towards more surface aspects of the experience of referencing.

Category A: Using references to develop a broader and deeper argument and understanding. To make sure I have a wide range of resources, and to increase my knowledge in the assignment topic. To supplement readings with those that may disagree with another author – to define the areas of agreement and disagreement and then form my own argument.

Approaches in category A seem to attach an intrinsic value to references and the processes that accompany their use. There is an awareness that references are more than just the inclusion of an in-text citation indicating another author. There seems to be a structured process that involves planning and relating pre-existing thoughts to the focus of the essay and the ideas in other texts. Such approaches tend to involve different points of view on a topic, integrating and juxtaposing ideas in relation to each other from different perspectives. There also is an awareness of a need to link the ideas underpinning the arguments together, systematically referencing in the process of doing so.

Category B: Using references to show credible evidence for the argument. Like category A, category B links the process of referencing to the development of an evidence-base for the arguments being made. There is an awareness of an importance of being able to anchor the arguments outside of the essay to other valued texts and authors. Maintaining a credible position is a key aspect of this approach. Different to category A, this approach does not tend to show as much awareness of alternative perspectives or arguments. Rather it uses references to underpin the main argument being put forward by the student-writer.

The approaches described above seem to hold an intrinsic value towards referencing, one that views the process as adding value to the experience of formulating ideas to create an argument. In contrast, the approaches described below, tend to hold an extrinsic value towards referencing, that is, a view of referencing which seems to attribute its value to an aspect outside of the argumentation process, typically on more surface features such as vague ideas of appearing academic or formulaic processes.

Category C: Using references to appear academic. Category C places more importance on form rather than substance. It is not so much about the meaning of the references and how they relate to the argument being made by the student-writer, but on how a use of references might appear to a teacher/reader who is looking for evidence of scholarliness. Approaches in this category and the next have completely missed the point about referencing. They do not seem to have an intention which is about the development of ideas and understanding that can arise from a scholarly use of referencing. Rather they seem to use references to impress the teacher.

Category D: Using references as a way of following a formula. Approaches in category D are formulaic in nature, seeming to reproduce references in essays for reasons such as how easy they are to get and how many can be included. There seems to be little thought into how the references can add to the argument of an essay, and no awareness that there is a process underpinning referencing that can develop a broad understanding of the issues being discussed in the essay. It seems to attribute its value to extrinsic sources, such as some perceived value or magic formula of inserting references mechanically without real thought or integration, often because a teacher expects it. It is similar to approaches in C but different in it is more concerned about getting it done efficiently, not bothering to worry if it actually appears academic to the teacher.

Overall, there is a logical and positive relationship between the qualitatively different categories, that is, cohesive conceptions tend to be related to deep approaches and fragmented conceptions tend to be related to surface approaches in the students’ experience of referencing.

A little less than a third of the responses categorised with a cohesive conception of referencing were related to a statistically significantly higher mark for the essay. In other words, cohesive conceptions of referencing tend to be related to statistically significant higher achievement. It should be noted that no relationship between approaches and achievement were found in this study.

It is clear from the results that not all students reported thinking about referencing in essays in the same way. Some categories of conceptions, A and B, saw referencing as not simply putting in-text citations in a paragraph and a full reference at the end of an essay. They tended to view referencing as a more complex phenomenon, intrinsically related to the development and substantiation of argument. Demonstration of understanding, building on the works of others, adding weight to argument and proving to the student-writer and others that the arguments make sense were some of the ideas related to this group of conceptions, which were forward-looking or prospective in nature.

In contrast, other categories of conceptions, C and D, seemed to separate the development of understanding, validation of reasoning and scholarliness from the experience of referencing in the essay. These concepts were more closely related to a retrospective view of referencing, not searching for a deeper personal understanding and depth of argument, but adhering to instructions of how to successfully complete the essay and how to avoid plagiarism.

Turning to a description of student approaches, the results suggest that not all students approach referencing in the same way. Some categories describe referencing in ways that seemed to intrinsically value the process for its contribution to their understanding. These approaches and those whose intent is focused on providing credible evidence for the arguments of an essay seem to have more structure to the experience. The interview process revealed that students reporting an approach consistent with a deep category tended to start earlier in the process, consult a wider variety of hard-print and electronic resources, and reviewed their referencing and argument often.

In contrast, other categories of approaches seemed to have an extrinsic value of the experience of referencing, attributing its value to external features of an essay such as a need to present a text which appeared to be appropriately academic, but whose choice of references were not at all scholarly or based on real reflection. Often these approaches seemed to be quite formulaic in nature, following some sort of structure that was not aligned to the arguments being put forward. This category seems to echo some of the characteristics of approaches to writing essays in earlier research.

The results indicate that students, whose conceptions were categorised as cohesive, tended to report approaches which were categorised as deep. Similarly, students whose conceptions were categorised as fragmented tended to report approaches which were categorised as surface. These associations and the fact that cohesive conceptions were associated to higher marks, indicate that this study has some suggestions to make to improve how students reference in essays. Firstly, around two thirds of the students did not appear to conceive of referencing in a way that would make the teacher confident of their ability to use references.

Class discussions, the use of textual models and the unpacking of reasoning and processes behind the choice of referencing are some of the things that teachers might need to engage in more systematically. In addition, the results indicate that cohesive conceptions of referencing seem to be related to deep approaches to referencing. If this association holds in other studies, then teachers can help students to think more appropriately about referencing if they improve their approaches to referencing, and vice-versa.

An understanding of how to support and shape students’ approaches to referencing is essential if we are to take more than a minimalist position on supporting the learning experiences of students. When cases of plagiarism arise, a university should ensure that they have done everything possible to help students avoid such academic misconduct, especially if the consequence is that they may not be admitted into the profession. To support students appropriately, teachers need, as a first step, to be able to describe the circumstances under which students may fail to reference appropriately, the circumstances in which they tend to reference successfully and how to help them experience the latter irrespective of their approach. The categories of description of students conceptions and approaches to referencing in this study can be used to help teachers guide students into more appropriate ways of referencing; avoiding risky strategies such as trying to reference according to some imaginary formula. The descriptions of referencing as a way of making meaning, checking credible evidence and developing an argument could stand, for example, as sound principles on which to base policies for appropriate standards of referencing for students.

Referencing can be thought of as the tip of the iceberg of scholarly experiences of learning at university. It needs to be underpinned by sound reasoning, exhaustive literature searches, critical evaluation, synthesis and crafting of argument, and an awareness of academic and disciplinary standards. Teachers will help their students to better understand the nature of referencing if they can help students unpack what it means to think about and engage in referencing in more scholarly ways.