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What’s the Eberly Center reading and thinking about this month?

The Research and Scholarship Digest, published the first Monday of each month, consists of short summaries of recently peer-reviewed studies on teaching and learning topics. This digest offers a view into what we are reading and thinking about at the Eberly Center that:

• adds to our understanding of how students learn
• is potentially generalizable across teaching contexts in higher education
• provokes reflection on implications for our teaching and educational development practices.

We hope the readers of this digest will find it a useful resource for staying in-tune with the rapidly expanding education research literature.

Iddris, F., Agyapong, K., Kparl, E. M., & Mensah, P. O. (2026). Unlocking students’ creative confidence through design thinking practices: A parallel mediation of collaboration and diversity, and creativity. Active Learning in Higher Education.

In today’s innovation-driven world, educators increasingly turn to Design Thinking Practices (DTP) to equip students with essential 21st-century skills. However, a critical question remains: how exactly does DTP translate into creative confidence? A recent study of 419 tertiary students in Ghana addressed this by examining whether DTP works directly or through the "bridge" of collaboration and diversity and creativity.

Using a quantitative cross-sectional design and structural equation modelling, the research revealed a surprising result: DTP does not have a direct significant impact on creative confidence. Instead, the relationship is entirely mediated by the student's environment and internal processes. Specifically, DTP significantly increases engagement in collaboration and diversity by 36.3%, which subsequently boosts creative confidence by 57.3%. Additionally, DTP enhances creativity by 22.4%, further driving confidence by 54%.

The effectiveness of design thinking is contingent upon creating a collaborative, diverse, and creative culture. Simply teaching the methodology is insufficient; instructors must act as facilitators of interdisciplinary teamwork and hands-on experimentation. By focusing on these mediating "resources," schools can move beyond theory to foster a genuine belief in a student's ability to innovate. This research highlights that while DTP provides the tools, it is the structured interaction with diverse peers that ultimately unlocks a student’s creative potential.

Yan, Y., Woznicki, N., & Muenks, K. (2025). Whose beliefs matter? The impact of undergraduate students’ perceptions of instructors’ and peers’ field-specific ability beliefs. Motivation Science, 11(4), 439–452.

Field-specific ability beliefs (FABs) are beliefs that certain academic fields require brilliance (i.e., exceptionally high intellectual ability) in order to be successful, and some studies have suggested that these are better predictors of outcomes than domain-general beliefs such as a growth vs fixed mindset. For this work, researchers experimentally investigated the extent to which FABs held by instructors and peers impact undergraduate students’ motivational, psychological, and behavioral outcomes (nine in total). This 2x2 design (n=498) featured a hypothetical difficult course where  students were presented with one of four scenarios that described instructors with either high or low FABs, and peers with either high or low FABs and asked to anticipate their motivational (e.g., self-efficacy), psychological (e.g., belonging), and behavioral (e.g., effort regulation) outcomes. Consistent with findings from prior non-experimental work, results largely showed that higher FABs for both instructor and peers had a negative impact across students’ outcomes. There were some differences between the effects of peers vs instructors, suggesting that certain outcomes may be more directly impacted by instructors (e.g., emotional cost) while others appear to be more impacted by peers (e.g.,effort regulation). In any case, minimizing FABs in the classroom is likely a step toward better supporting student success.

Yu, J. H., Tu, F., & Yelamar, K. S. (2026). Structured flexibility in microcredentials: A temporal analysis of self-regulated achievement pathways. Computers & Education. 

This study examines how learners succeed in multi-course microcredential programs by analyzing their behavior over time, rather than relying on the widely used “dropout vs. completion” models. Using data from 885 learners who completed a six-month professional certification from Coursera, the study combines Self-Regulated Learning (SRL) theory and Temporal Learning Analytics (TLA) to understand how learning strategies evolve. It distinguishes between high achievers and low achievers among completers, focusing on how they engage across different stages of the program. The findings show that early active engagement, such as completing quizzes or peer assessments, is a powerful predictor of long-term success, while passive activities like watching lectures or reading materials have little impact. In particular, completing early high-effort tasks dramatically increases the likelihood of high achievement. Also, learners who consistently complete summative assessments are far more likely to succeed. Although early behaviors matter, success is ultimately shaped by sustained engagement with these high-stakes tasks over time. Another finding is that high achievers follow multiple different behavioral pathways, but they all converge on completing key graded tasks. In contrast, low achievers show inconsistent and fragmented patterns. Finally, the article proposes a model of “structured flexibility”: successful learners adapt their strategies flexibly, but consistently meet core assessment requirements. 

Yust, P. K., Moshontz, H., Wong, M., Dotson, K., Kushlev, K., & Hard, B. M. (2026). Policies to put smartphones away may have limited impact on college students' classroom experience. Mind, Brain, and Education, 20(2). 

In this between-subjects study, 256 undergraduate students from Psychology and Neuroscience departments at Duke University were recruited to participate in a study designed to measure the impact of smartphone presence during a lecture on the levels of distraction, interest and enjoyment, and boredom students experienced and on their ability to recall lecture content at the end of class. Both groups attended “semi-naturalistic” 30-minute lectures that were designed to be reasonably challenging and delivered by an actor. Students in both groups were asked to take notes by hand on paper provided by the researchers. Each group was then given smartphone instructions: one group was instructed to leave their smartphone visible on their desk or lap for use at the end of the lecture; the other group was asked to put their phone away in a bag during the lecture. While no significant differences were observed in the two groups’ interest and enjoyment, boredom, or comprehension, there were significant differences in the levels of self-reported distraction, with students in the smartphone presence condition reporting significantly more distraction. There were a variety of limitations in the study, which are discussed in detail, with suggestions for further research.