A Review on the Training Effects and Learners’ Perceptions Towards Asynchronous Computer-Mediated Peer Feedback for L2 Writing Revision

Abstract

Few review studies have been conducted to systematically examine how asynchronous computer-mediated peer feedback affects students’ revision quality and perceptions in L2 writing contexts after training. This study thus aims to fill the research gap by investigating the training effects of asynchronous computer-mediated feedback with regards to (1) the quality of peer comments, (2) the adoption rate, and (3) quality of student revision in L2 writing revision. In this paper, the researchers qualitatively examined related empirical studies based on three variables. The process of analyzing the refined corpus led the researchers to identify the following findings. First, it was found that asynchronous computer-mediated communication could lead to an enhancement of peer comments quality and a primacy of global-oriented and revision-based peer comments, with comment type focusing on ‘suggestion’ and ‘evaluation’, though the adoption rate of the revision-oriented comments was usually less than fifty percent. Nevertheless, once learners practically adopted the peer comments with the acknowledgement of their effectiveness, successful revisions for both local and global issues and the development of writing performance could be expected. In addition, it was also elicited that students generally appreciated the great convenience and anonymity of the computer-mediated technology; however, online distractions and the lack of face-to-face communication and verbal interactions might also negatively influence students’ revision quality. Given this, some suggestions for future implementations of asynchronous computer-mediated peer feedback was proposed, in the hope of shedding some light for educational practitioners and scholars interested in the incorporation of computer-mediated communication and peer reviewing in L2 writing.