Instructional Communication

Overview of Instructional Communication Research

Since its recognition as a field of study in 1972, individuals who conduct research in the instructional communication field have focused their research efforts on the role that classroom instruction plays in student learning. These research efforts center on three domains of learning—affective, behavioral, and cognitive—that occur across instructional setting. Affective learning refers to the attitudes, values, and beliefs that students develop toward the knowledge or content they are taught. When these attitudes, values, and beliefs are positive, student affect is high; when these attitudes, values, and beliefs are negative, student affect is low. The positive or negative valence of these attitudes, beliefs, and values is internalized by students and becomes associated with their like or dislike and their appreciation or disapproval they attribute toward an instructor, the course content, or the behaviors recommended in a course. Behavioral learning refers to students’ ability to develop and hone the physical skills or movement necessary to perform a particular behavior. Cognitive learning refers to students’ acquisition, retention, understanding, and utilization of the knowledge or the content they are taught. Cognitive learning occurs when students are able to master and integrate a set of skills into their learning repertoire; these skills can range from lower-level thinking skills (e.g., remembering, understanding) to middle-level thinking skills (e.g., applying, analyzing) to higher-level thinking skills (e.g., evaluating, creating). While all three domains of learning are arguably essential to the learning process, instructional communication researchers generally focus on the study of affective learning and cognitive learning rather than behavioral learning, primarily because they believe that the study of behavioral learning is not as important or as relevant to the learning process in higher-grade levels (e.g., technical schools, college) as it is in lower-grade levels. They also believe that in order for cognitive learning to occur, affective learning must occur first.

Instructional communication researchers are also interested in the study of student state motivation, which refers to students’ attempts to obtain knowledge or skills from classroom activities they find meaningful, and student communication satisfaction, which refers to the positive feelings students experience after interacting with instructors. Combined with student affective learning and student cognitive learning, these four constructs comprise what instructional communication researchers refer to as student learning outcomes; all four outcomes are considered to represent student academic success. As such, these outcomes often are studied in conjunction with three general bodies of research conducted by instructional communication researchers: instructor characteristics, student characteristics, and classroom environment.

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