A systematic review of small group communication in post-secondary online courses

Abstract

The purpose of this systematic review is to establish a comprehensive understanding of research trend and findings of the current studies focused on small group communication in post-secondary online courses. Comprehensive searching electronic databases and step-by-step screening procedures were performed to locate a total of eighteen journal articles published in 2000-2009 as a final data included in the review. Two independent reviewers coded the studies completely, which were mapped inductively into four main categories based on common themes of their research focuses. The findings of individual studies were sub-categorized, synthesized, and summarized. To conclude, the review provides major findings extracted from the eighteen studies and discusses gaps and limitations of existing studies to make some suggestions for future research.