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Table 4 Motivating and demotivating reasons to actively participate in seminars

From: Peer-instructed seminar attendance is associated with improved preparation, deeper learning and higher exam scores: a survey study

To what extent do the following reasons improve your motivation to participate actively in seminars?

Mean (SD)

≥4 (%)

 I wanted to write down the correct answers myself, so I don’t have to rely on the wiki’s

3.99 (1.06)

79.2

 I want to better understand the content by discussing with my peers

3.77 (1.02)

69.3

 I want my subgroup to be able to present the correct answer during the plenary discussion

3.74 (0.92)

68.1

 I wanted to be able to criticize the correctness and completeness of answers given by other subgroups

2.96 (1.02)

31.9

 I knew the teacher would not provided us the correct answer, therefore I wanted to find out the correct answers myself

2.91 (1.12)

33.0

 It was easier to ask the teacher for help, when the assignments were discussed with my peers

2.84 (1.15)

33.0

 I expected that active participation would lead to goodwill of our teacher to provide us with additional clues

2.62 (1.16)

23.1

 I wanted to find out which assignments should be discussed in the Meet The Expert session

1.68 (0.91)

4.4

To what extent do the following reasons decrease your motivation to participate actively in seminars?

Mean (SD)

≥4 (%)

Mean (SD) students not attending

≥4 (%)

 I did not want to explain everything to my (unprepared) peers

1.91 (1.14)

12.1

2.36 (1.29)

27.3

 Repetition of the assignments during the seminar; First in peer-discussion followed by plenary discussion

2.43 (1.16)

20.9

2.45 (0.93)

9.1

 I knew that the correct answer would be placed on the wiki

1.98 (1.03)

7.7

2.18 (0.98)

9.1

 I knew the teacher would not provide us with the correct answer

1.95 (1.04)

6,6

2.36 (1.21)

9.1

 I am not interested in the content of this course

2.16 (1.07)

9.9

1.91 (0.83)

0

 I knew my peers would prepare the assignments

1.90 (0.90)

5.5

1.73 (0.79)

0

  1. Students could indicate to what extent every argument for active participation applied to them using an anchored scale ranging from 1 (little contribution/little reduction) to 5 (large contribution/large reduction. ≥ 4 (%) illustrates the percentage of students rating the Likert-items with a 4 or 5