Operationally defining turn-taking in collaborative online documents

Turn-taking is an important aspect of collaboration, but turns are difficult to operationally define within online collaborative documents. For example, turns can be taken by multiple group members simultaneously, and in some cases, their turns may seem to meld together into a single written contribution. Thus far, no clear definition for a turn has been provided in this context. This paper proposes that a turn be defined as an instance of writing that begins with the first character contributed by a member and ends with the last character of an uninterrupted string of text contributed by the same member or by the end of the document. A computer system was developed in order to automatically calculate the number of turns within a text. This turn-taking data will be of use to practitioners who strive to encourage high levels of written interaction among members of collaborative writing groups. Copyright © 2021 International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS). All rights reserved.