WIP: Exploring the Role of Sentiment in Tutor-Student Interaction. The Case Study of CS and Architecture Formative Studio Critiques

This work-in-progress research presents a novel approach to assessing tutor-student interactions in design studio critiques, thereby advancing studio assessment methodologies. Following constructivist theories, students learn by practicing professional design behaviors. They introduce new concepts and progress according to the tutor's feedback and demonstration. Despite their principal role, critique interactions are often tutor-centric and ambiguous, resulting in negative sentiments that may hinder participation. Current methods measure solely learners' performance of design practices while neglecting the cognitive actions involved, such as the learner's sentiment. This gap limits assessing the effectiveness of the interaction. In this study, we measure the effect of sentiment on introducing new design concepts, identified as first occurrences (FOs). We demonstrate the approach in two natural case studies comprising six critiques of three CS students and three Architecture students. NLP algorithms are developed to quantify the distribution of FOs generated by students and tutors within positive and negative sentiment environments. Changes in the sentiment throughout critiques measure the temporal role of sentiment in generating FOs. Observations exhibit differences in sentiment between CS and Architecture students. In both courses, more learner-centric FOs occurred in a positive sentiment environment. Using explicit assessment methods opens new possibilities for establishing real-time feedback systems, leading studio-based education to its next step in reshaping constructivist pedagogy.