Motivation and emotion/Assessment/Chapter/Feedback

General feedback about
book chapters

General feedback about the 2024 student-authored book chapters
Detailed feedback about each individual chapter is available on the respective talk pages

Overall

The overall quality of chapters was reasonably good, but there was a very wide range
The main issues were:
1. Unacknowledged and low-level use of genAI
2. Insufficient review of research
3. Lack of social contributions

The best overviews consisted of:
1. A scenario/case study in a feature box with a relevant image
2. A simple, evocative description of the psychological problem or phenomenon
3. Clear and relevant focus questions in a feature box

Usually a well selected range of theories were considered
Weaker chapters tended to use more general theories; stronger chapters tended to identify more specific theories
Usually theories were explained in reasonably good depth, but theoretical depth was often a key differentiator between chapters
Most chapters could be improved by building more strongly on related chapters (i.e., by embedding links from the first mention of key words to other chapters)
Often more practical examples would have been useful to demonstrate how theories work in practice

Sometimes relevant research was summarised, but could often have been more indepth
Place more emphasis on major reviews such as meta-analyses
Sometimes there was insufficient citation to support claims

There was reasonably good integration between theory and research
However, there was often there was more emphasis on theory than research — strive for balance

Useful summaries of key points were provided
Good emphasis on take-home messages, but could these messages could often be improved and made more explicit.

Overall, the quality of written expression was reasonably good, but this varied widely
Some of the most common problems were:
1. poor grammar — there's so many ways these days to get help to improve grammar towards a more professional standard
2. lack of sufficient citation — it is problematic in science communication to make claims without clarifying the evidence on which they are based
3. write using 3rd person perspective, rather than 1st person[1]
4. serial commas [2] should be used (they are part of APA style)
5. use of ownership apostrophes
6. "People" is often a better term than "individuals"
7. Avoid starting sentences with a citation unless the author is particularly pertinent. Instead, it is more interesting for the the content/key point to be communicated, with the citation included along the way or, more typically, in parentheses at the end of the sentence.
Use Australian spelling.
The main areas for improving APA style were:
1. Citations with three or more authors should use the first author's surname followed by et al. and the year
2. Reference formatting areas for improvement:
  1. capitalisation
  2. italicisation
  3. use of hyperlinked dois

Embedded interwiki links to Wikipedia articles were underdone; more could be usefully added to most chapters
Embedded interwiki links to related Wikiversity book chapters were very underutilised — this was disappointing because key to this exercise is situating the chapter within the related network of chapters
Images were reasonably well used, with several students uploading their own images (thankyou!)
Tables were less commonly used, but were usually very useful
Feature boxes were generally well used
Quizzes were generally well used
Scenarios/case studies were reasonably well used, but often more examples would have been helpful

There were many valuable improvements made to past and current chapters
The amount and quality of contributions varied widely - some students made no contributions whilst some excelled and were awarded bonus marks
Unless there were direct links to evidence, no marks were provided