Does Twitter influence student perceptions of teacher behaviors? As part of a session surrounding new and emerging technologies in instruction, I presented my research (co-authored with Kristen Bostedo-Conway) on Twitter’s role in the classroom at the National Communication Association 2011 National Convention in New Orleans, LA.

We conducted this research in Spring 2010 to better understand the role of Twitter in the classroom. Our findings give preliminary evidence that student-instructor interaction on Twitter has a relationship with student perceptions of teacher behavior. Most interestingly, students’ perceptions of a teacher’s non-verbal immediacy was heightened by out-of-class Twitter use.

These findings, the full text of which is under review for publication, have inspired us to continue this research into Twitter uses in the classroom.

Below is our handout from the convention which contains the research abstract and demonstrates the correlations identified between standard measures of student perceptions of teacher behavior (instructor credibility, content relevance, and immediacy) and instructor and student Twitter use: