Helge Ivar Strømsø

Writing from multiple texts is a crucial academic literacy practice at the university level. Therefore, students should learn to attend to, evaluate, and use information about the sources by the time they reach the end of upper secondary school. The present study investigated differences in upper secondary school students’ ( N = 87) sourcing practices when composing a short article based on multiple texts. The data consisted of students’ written articles and log files recording their time spent on the task and revisits to the source texts during the writing task. Based on analyses of sourcing in students’ written articles, five source user profiles were identified: (1) Advanced source users ( n = 18); (2) Elaborative source users ( n = 15); (3) Basic source users ( n = 15); (4) Vague source users ( n = 15); and (5) No-source users ( n = 24). Students in the three more capable profiles incorporated at least once an explicit source-content link into their articles, varying the number of source features used. During the writing task, Advanced source users revisited both more credible texts more frequently than less capable source users. Their composed articles also most often included citations and main claims from both more credible texts. Conversely, the other students who engaged in sourcing revisited and referenced only one more credible text. The results of the present study implicate that students might benefit from differentiated instructional support to accurately and elaborately cite sources in their writing.

Writing from multiple texts is a crucial academic skill that needs to be mastered at the university level. Therefore, basic sourcing abilities, such as citing sources of information used, should be learned by the time students reach the end of upper secondary school. The present study investigated differences in upper secondary school students' (N = 87) sourcing practices when composing a short article based on multiple texts varying in credibility. In addition to the students’ articles, the data included log files that tracked their time spent on the task and revisits to the texts during the writing task. Based on analyses of sourcing in students’ written products, five source user profiles were found: 1) Advanced source users (n = 18), 2) Elaborative source users (n = 15), 3) Basic source users (n = 15), 4) Vague source users (n = 15), and 5) No-source users (n = 24). Students in three more capable source user profiles incorporated at least once an explicit source-content link into their articles, varying the number of source features used. In contrast, other students' use of sources remained vague or non-existent. During the writing task, Advanced source users revisited both more credible texts more frequently than less capable source users. Their composed articles also most often included citations and main claims from both more credible texts. Instead, the other students, who engaged in sourcing, focused only on one more credible text by a researcher. Therefore, students can benefit from differentiated instructional support to accurately and elaborately cite credible sources in their writing.

With the advent of large language models (LLMs), a major concern has become how students can be taught artificial intelligence (AI) literacy. Arguably, a necessary starting point for teaching AI literacy is knowledge about students’ pre-existing understanding of how LLMs work and the output they generate. Therefore, the main purpose of this study was to explore students’ understanding of ChatGPT-generated text, that is, their understanding of the origin of ChatGPT’s information and of how ChatGPT uses that information in generating textual output. Two hundred sixty-seven Norwegian high-school students responded in writing to broad open-ended questions about these issues, and we used thematic analysis in qualitatively exploring their conceptions and misconceptions. Students held a range of adequate and adaptive conceptions regarding the sources, the output, the function, and the use of ChatGPT-generated text. However, they also held several misconceptions that may hamper constructive use of ChatGPT as a literacy and learning tool. In particular, there was considerable confusion regarding the information sources that ChatGPT draws on in generating text, with an overestimation of the general quality of those sources also associated with a tendency to put unwarranted trust in ChatGPT-generated textual output. Potential implications concern both the conceptualization of AI literacy and efforts to promote such literacy among students.

In this study, I investigated the print exposure and website exposure of undergraduates in relation to their scores on a text comprehension test. Print exposure was measured with a national version of the author recognition test, whereas a new website recognition test was developed to measure students’ exposure to texts on the internet. The participants’ reading attitudes and number of years in higher education were included as control variables. Exploratory factor analysis suggested that three factors are measured by the website recognition test: (1) lifestyle topics; (2) news and culture; and (3) social activity. The results showed that only print exposure predicted text comprehension significantly and positively, but not for students with a high score on the website recognition test. Moderation analyses indicated that the pattern was clearest for the social activity factor of the website recognition measure. Hence, high activity on social media seems to diminish or remove the positive relationship between print exposure and text comprehension. The results confirm that print exposure relates positively to important aspects of students’ literacy, while further studies should be carried out to investigate the potential negative relationship between website exposure and literacy.

Background: Previous research indicates that students lack sufficient online credibility evaluation skills. However, the results are fragmented and difficult to compare as they are based on different types of measures and indicators. Consequently, there is no clear understanding of the structure of credibility evaluation.Objectives: The present study sought to establish the structure of credibility evaluation of online texts among 265 sixth graders.Methods: Students' credibility evaluation skills were measured with a task in which they read four online texts, two more credible (a popular science text and a newspaper article) and two less credible (a layperson's blog text and a commercial text). Students read one text at a time and evaluated the author's expertise, the author's benevolence and the quality of the evidence before ranking the texts according to credibility. Four competing measurement models of students' credibility evaluations were assessed.Results: The model termed the Genre‐based Confirming‐Questioning Model reflected the structure of credibility evaluation best. The results suggest that credibility evaluation reflects the source texts and requires two latent skills: confirming the more credible texts and questioning the less credible texts. These latent skills of credibility evaluation were positively associated with students' abilities to rank the texts according to credibility.Implications: The study revealed that the structure of credibility evaluation might be more complex than previously conceptualized. Consequently, students would benefit from activities that ask them to carefully analyse different credibility aspects of more and less credible texts, as well as the connections between these aspects.

On March 12, 2020, Norwegian universities closed campus areas and reorganised teaching to digital environments due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In a sample of 8,907 university students, we investigated how aspects of students’ self-regulation were affected by their motivation, perceived stress, working conditions, and remote teaching offered in the new and challenging situation. Specifically, we assumed that self-regulation in terms of time management, procrastination, effort regulation, and time for independent studies might be affected. Analyses based on structural equation modelling (SEM) showed that motivation significantly positively predicted time management and effort regulation and that procrastination negatively predicted time management and effort regulation. Students’ perceived stress increased both procrastination and independent study time, whereas remote teaching only weakly reduced procrastination. Students’ physical working conditions slightly affected time management. An important finding of the study is the minor impact of students’ attendance of remote classes on self-regulation.

Research has shown that students differ in their abilities to evaluate the credibility of online texts, and, in general, many perform poorly on online evaluation tasks. This study extended current knowledge by examining students’ abilities to justify the credibility of online texts from different perspectives, thus providing a more nuanced understanding of students’ credibility evaluation ability. We examined how upper secondary school students (N = 73; aged 16 to 17) evaluated author expertise, author intention, the publication venue, and the quality of evidence when reading four texts about the effects of sugar consumption in a web-based environment. Additionally, we examined how students’ prior topic knowledge, Internet-specific justification beliefs, and time on task were associated with their credibility justifications. Students evaluated author expertise, author intention, the venue, and the quality of evidence for each text on a six-point scale and provided written justifications for their evaluations. While students’ credibility evaluations were quite accurate, their credibility justifications lacked sophistication. Inter-individual differences were considerable, however. Regression analysis revealed that time on task was a statistically significant unique predictor of students’ credibility justifications. Instructional implications are discussed.