Student feedback literacy and engagement with feedback: a case study of Chinese undergraduate students

The dissonance between teachers’ substantial effort to provide feedback and students’ under-engagement with feedback has been consistently reported in higher education. A contributing factor to this disparity students’ lack of feedback literacy, however, has been under-researched. This case study of two Chinese undergraduate students therefore investigated: (a) what the focal students’ profiles of feedback literacy were, and (b) whether and how their feedback literacy mediated their engagement with feedback. Data from multiple sources revealed that the students’ feedback literacy was multifaceted, involving cognitive capacity, social-affective disposition, and social-affective capacity. Each of the three aspects varied across and within individual students, suggesting the emergent and situated nature of feedback literacy. Nonetheless, the unbalanced development of the three components often limited the students’ engagement with written corrective feedback. The paper concludes by highlighting the centrality of alignment between cognitive capacity, social-affective capacity, and social-affective disposition in fostering student engagement with feedback.