University students’ strategies and criteria during self-assessment: instructor’s feedback, rubrics, and year level effects

Abstract

This study explores the effects of feedback type, feedback occasion, and year level on student self-assessments in higher education. In total, 126 university students participated in this randomized experiment under three experimental conditions (i.e., rubric feedback, instructor’s written feedback, and rubric feedback plus instructor’s written feedback). Participants, after random assignment to feedback condition, were video-recorded performing a self-assessment on a writing task both before and after receiving feedback. The quality of self-assessment strategies decreased after feedback of all kinds, but the number of strategies increased for the combined feedback condition. The number of self-assessment criteria increased for rubric and combined conditions, while feedback helped shift criteria use from basic to advanced criteria. Student year level was not systematically related to changes in self-assessment after feedback. In general, the combination of rubric and instructor’s feedback produced the best effects.