The ABC of MOOCs: Affect and its inter-play with behavior and cognition

Munira Syed

Abstract:

We report on a study of affective states of learners
in a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) and the interplay of Affect, Behavior and Cognition at various stages of
the course. Affect is measured through a series of self-reports
from learners at strategic time posts during the period of study.
Behavior is characterized in terms of a learners’ engagement,
interactivity, impatience and reflectivity, which constitute a set
of novel high-level features derived from the clickstream of
learner interactions. Cognition is evaluated from the performance of learners on assessments that are part of the course.
We discover that learners in the MOOC experience multiple
as well as mixed emotions as they go through the course,
which we handle using the psychological dimensions of arousal
and valence. This results in a set of emotional quadrants,
whose co-occurrence analysis reveals a strong association with
cognition and specific behavioral characteristics demonstrated
by the learner. These results advance our understanding of the
experience of MOOC learners to a more holistic level across
the key dimensions of affect, behavior and cognition. They
also have important implications for the design of the next
generation MOOCs that can potentially leverage affect and
behavior-aware interventions to drive greater personalization
and eventually, improved learning outcomes.