Student Consumption of Faculty Effort in Formal and Informal Contexts
A. Professor
Department of Social Science Discipline
Large State University
Department of Social Science Discipline
Large State University
Instructors of college-level classes commonly report student underuse of scheduled office hours. It is not unusual to hear anecdotal reports from instructors that students in a given academic period fail to consult them even once during formally scheduled office hours. In such situations, instructors are forced to remain in one location for the duration of the contracted hours, and may fear being caught out during quick trips to the restroom, to get coffee, or to discuss minor matters with neighboring colleagues or administrators.
This study investigated the influence of formal and informal office hour schedules on students' willingness to consult the instructor outside of scheduled class periods. We determined that informal office hours increased the total amount of instructor time spent meeting with students outside of class. These data suggest that scheduling formal office hours actually discourages students from seeking help from instructors outside of class.
Method
Subjects. 228 undergraduate students enrolled part- or full-time at LSU (varying majors) were randomly assigned to the formal and informal office hour conditions. 108 students participated in the formal condition, and were enrolled in the Winter quarter of a popular social science class. The remaining 120 students participated n the informal condition, and were enrolled in the Spring quarter of the same class.
Materials. The same instructor taught both experimental groups, using nearly identical notes and overheads, syllabi, grading criteria, quizzes and exams. The two groups met in different classrooms but at identical times: Tuesday and Thursday from 10:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
Procedures. Students in both conditions were told that the instructor would be available outside of class by appointment, but also that students were welcome to drop by at any time and that the instructor would do her best to make appropriate time available for them. Students in the formal condition were told in addition that the instructor's office hours would be held Monday and Wednesday from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m.. In the formal condition, students who asked for appointments outside of class were first asked if the formal office hours were convenient. If the students then indicated that they could not come during these hours, appointments were scheduled using the same procedures as appointments scheduled for students in the informal condition.
At the end of each quarter, the instructor made a subjective estimate of (a) the average number of hours per week spent interacting with students outside of class; and (b) the standard deviation in this number of hours over the 12 weeks of the quarter.
Results
The instructor answered the question, "Approximately how much time did you spend with students outside of class?" twice: once at the end of the Winter quarter and again at the end of the Spring quarter. Her responses are shown in Table 1. A textual analysis resulted in the data presented in Figure 1, which shows the subjective estimates of consumed instructor effort per week together with estimated 95% credible intervals. Assuming that hours per week was approximately normally distributed, the credible intervals were computed by multiplying the instructor's estimated standard deviation by 1.96 and adding and subtracting the result from the estimated mean.
The number of hours consumed by the informal group is approximately three times that of the formal group. Furthermore, the informal group more consistently consumed larger amounts of time than the formal group. Although the estimates shown in Figure 1 are in fact just a single subjective rating (per quarter) by the instructor, the 95% credible intervals do not overlap, indicating a difference between the formal and informal context significant at at least an alpha=.05 level.Discussion
In this study, two groups of nominally identical students were provided with formal and informal office hours permitting them to contact their instructor outside of class hours. Students approached the instructor far less frequently when formal office hours were provided than when formal office hours were not provided, even though both groups of students were told that they could visit the instructor at any time that was mutually convenient.
This finding suggests that not only do students underuse formal office hours, but that the very presence of such a schedule inhibits them from seeking out the instructor at other times as well. This finding has important implications for college-level instructors everywhere, depending on their goals. Instructors wishing to minimize contact with students should schedule formal office hours, whereas instructors wishing to maximize such contact should not hold formal office hours. Furthermore, students will more consistently seek out instructors who do not hold formal office hours, apparently sucking up as much time between classes as instructors have available, resulting in a "ceiling effect" in the amount of effort expended by the instructors. This conclusion is supported by the smaller 95% credible set observed in the informal condition - which is remarkable given the much higher mean in this condition.
Our data suggest several exciting new avenues of research. It is evident from the instructor's responses in Table 1 that the informal context may have led students to believe that the instructor was willing to listen at great length to a great many personal revelations that had nothing to do with course material or requirements. It may be that a student's willingness to reveal personal secrets correlates with the degree of formality imposed by the office hour. Would shorter office hours lead to more or less formality in the student-instructor relationship? Would longer office hours keep students away from the instructor for longer periods, or is the absence of formal office hours equivalent to expansive formal scheduling of office hours? Finally, is it simply the presence of a schedule, no matter how stingy or generous, that keeps students away?
Perhaps the most important aspect of this study is its potential influence on university policy. Many universities mandate that their instructors hold formal office hours so that the student/customer is guaranteed to be able to find their instructors outside of class when necessary. This policy may be well-intentioned but based on flawed reasoning. A strategy more likely to guarantee a higher level of instructor-student interaction may be to prohibit scheduling of formal office hours. More research may be necessary to justify a change in policy.
14 comments:
This is brilliant. And eye-opening.
Review: While intriguing, the author's results may be contaminated by seasonal changes in student's sociability. We suspect, for example, that they are more likely to hump like bunnies in the spring quarter than in the winter quarter. Therefore, the experiment(s) should be re-run in the reverse order, i.e. informal hours in the winter q and formal hours in the spring q.
Future work might also study how this effect varies by discipline, goegraphical location, and cultural background of the students in question.
This is EXCELLENT.
You are assuming that university policies mandating office hours are in fact intended to promote instructor-student interaction, as opposed to the converse.
Good to know, especially because I'm teaching for the first time this fall. Note to self - keep strict formal office hours.
Brilliant.
This should be published!
I'm still trying to make this fit with my experience. I hold formal office hours yet write "and by appointment" on my syllabus. Sometimes I sit in my office all alone during my formal office hours; sometimes a student or two will come by. And then, right before or right after my formal hours are over...the deluge begins.
Of course, the end of the term should be excluded. Students get desperate and want to know they're going to pass, so they show up and brown-nose to make up for all the time they haven't been in my office all semester long.
Or are you just having fun with us, AP? :-P In any case, you really should test your hypothesis further and then publish the resulting study. Really!
You're a genius. And you should, in fact, publish this (somewhere other than your blog, I mean).
Anecdotally, in the semesters when I'm constantly changing or rescheduling office hours and basically end up telling the students that my hours are informal, regardless of what it offically says on the syllabus, they do come see me more. I think you're right.
My department at the University of Göteborg (Sweden) has a very relaxed attitude towards office hours and so do I. One problem is that the students come to expect this and instead of them complaining that the professor was not their during office hours (due to for example: getting coffee, going to bathroom, helping other student) - Now they compain that we are not their at any time they choose to appear.
Students have complained that staff are not present during lunch hours or after 6 pm. One of my students even compained that I did not reply immediately to an email he sent before midnight on Saturday - but thats another story!
This is fantastic! (I love Table 1). Timing of office hours has an effect too. I've learned to schedule MWF 8-9AM if I don't feel like seeing any students that semester. --Bob
Observation over a period of 14 years of a female faculty member [me] in one Scottish and one English university had led me to conclude that setting formal office hours had no effect, other than to ensure that NO students would want to consult me during the times set aside as Formal Office Hours (whenever those might be).
If everyone who has commented to this blog contributed to a study of this phenomenon, we could have a cross-disciplinary, cross-cultural research enterprise that surely any peer-reviewed journal would snap up in the twinkling of an eye ;-)
Thank you, Angry Professor.
This should be published! At my university, we are officially required to hold ten - yes, ten - formal office hours each week.
Some people actually schedule and post this many office hours. The result, of course, is that they are constantly accused of missing their office hours.
They have to miss them: there is no way to schedule meetings if you are going to respect the _ten_ scheduled office hours of each committee member.
I only schedule and post two to three hours, and I tell my students that they may also make appointments, and drop in (I warn them, many times, that if they just drop in, I may or may not be present, and may or may not be available to talk to them). The only people who show up to my scheduled hours are people who don't know me, and who have found out in the old-fashioned way, from the secretary or my door card
(or my website, if I have posted office hours there that term), when they can find me. Even in those cases, people are more likely to phone or e-mail for an appointment, rather than check for office hours and then phone or come by.
No matter how available you really are,
students will still say you are unavailable, unless you are as available as a 24-hour Wal*Mart.
Once again, this article should be published. Chronicle of Higher Education? Inside Higher Ed, at least?
With a more detailed version in an actual research journal?
"Formal" can be interpreted as "rigid." Since students have other classes, they can't always make the rigid scheduling of your office hour. (The "s" in "hours" is deceiving.)
Further, perhaps your students can detect the disdain for them and for holding office hours in general. Thus, when you briefly mention your office hour (while probably turning your nose up at them) they would just as soon not visit with you.
An increase in visits to professors with "informal" office hours could be a product of those professors' kindness and willingness to actually meet with students (evidence by the original holding of informal office hours).
Again, you and all of your sad followers seem to not want to be teachers. If your dream hasn't been crushed by a professor, much like yourself, perhaps you should go follow that path instead. Good luck!
Anonymous, you're absolutely right. I disdain my students, and I abhor having to talk to them at all. I schedule my office hour at 6:30 a.m. just to avoid contact with them. Because my hatred of my job is so palpable, and my contempt for my students so obvious, they feel like they can spend hours in my office baring their souls to me.
Jerk.
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