Effect of Peer Feedback Role: Task Performance, Feedback Implementation and Perceptions on Learning and Trust

When engaged in peer feedback activities, students can act as providers and/or recipients. While some researchers have suggested that these roles might influence students’ learning differently, there is still limited empirical evidence about the effect of each role on peer feedback outcomes. Our aim was to investigate the impact of the two peer feedback roles on task performance, feedback implementation, students’ perceptions of learning and trust. In a counter-balanced within-subject experimental design, forty-five third-year undergraduate psychology students worked on a cover letter analysis task and performed both roles as provider and recipient successively. After performing each role, we measured students’ task performance together with their perceptions of learning and trust. The results showed no significant effects of peer feedback roles on task performance and feedback implementation. Additionally, students perceived similar learning from providing or receiving peer feedback, and they also perceived similar trust in themselves and in their peers as providers of feedback.