Developing and Validating the Student Assessment-Based Feedback Literacy (SAFL) Instrument: A Mixed-Methods Approach

Feedback has great influences on student retention and completion, especially on the minority students in higher education. However, the debates on the paradoxical difference between feedback’s theoretical potential and its effect in actual practice remain unsettled. This study seeks to address some primary issues in feedback research by conceptualizing student assessment-based feedback literacy (SAFL) and developing the SAFL instrument. The systematic literature reviews in the study identify two trends of assessment-based feedback in higher education: no universal definition of assessment feedback and the lack of explicit understanding of how assessment and feedback literacies interacted. By building on the exiting student assessment literacy and student feedback literacy characteristics, the SAFL instrument is developed and validated through an exploratory sequential mixed-methods approach. The findings show the students’ and instructors’ suggestions on items revision during the process of SAFL refinement. Meanwhile, the need for instruments that can enable the development of feedback literacy is addressed. For example, the SAFL instrument may enable the development of student feedback literacy in health professions education where feedback is a critical pedagogic practice to patient safety and opportunities for health professional learners to develop a professional career of lifelong learning. In other words, the transferability of feedback literacy skills may support short-term academic gains and long-term benefits even beyond graduation. Finally, this research may also benefit future studies on assessment and feedback literacies