title: Using a filter to improve the chatroom experience in interactive medical education.
abstract: A computer chatroom exercise between faculty and students was used in a Human Behavior course for first-year medical students to provide an interactive exam review learning exercise. Two conditions were compared--one that filtered out all irrelevant student comments, and one without the filter that permitted all student comments. Four one-hour chatroom sessions, each with eight groups of five students, were conducted with all comments recorded. Comments were rated as on- or off-task by a blinded external faculty member. The filtered condition resulted in increased on-task and decreased off-task student comments compared with the non-filtered condition. However, students made fewer total comments in the filtered situation. Results suggested that a trade-off occurred between focused and uninhibited faculty-student communication; the implications are discussed.
authors.affiliation: American Association of Medical Colleges, USA.
authors.forename: Chris
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Candler
authors.forename: Phebe
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Tucker
authors.forename: Janice
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Triplett
authors.forename: Richard P
authors.initials: RP
authors.lastname: Trautman
mesh_terms: D003194:Computer-Assisted Instruction; D004501:Education, Medical / Q000379:methods*; D004504:Education, Medical, Undergraduate / Q000379:methods*; D004521:Educational Measurement; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D009825:Oklahoma; D012984:Software