Using Epistemic Synchronization Index (ESI) to measure students' knowledge elaboration process in CSCL Ning Ding a, * , Jieqiang Wei b , Marca Wolfensberger c a International Business School, Hanze University of Applied Sciences, Groningen, The Netherlands b Faculty of Mathematics, University of Groningen, The Netherlands c Hanze University of Applied Sciences, Groningen, The Netherlands article info Article history: Received 11 April 2014 Received in revised form 4 August 2014 Accepted 7 August 2014 Available online 27 August 2014 Keywords: CSCL Epistemic engagement Knowledge elaboration Sequential analysis Content analysis abstract Researchers in CSCL have used a wide range of qualitative and quantitative methods to track students' cognitive involvement during collaboration. However, neither individual method suffices the need to capture the dynamic evolvement of students' epistemic engagement in CSCL. We developed Epistemic Synchronization Index (ESI) to quantify students' epistemic engagement and evolvement. ESI reveals the knowledge elaboration process of groups, and it helps researchers as well as teachers to distinguish epistemic involvement between members within one group. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The potential of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) in terms of information retaining and higher-order thinking skills has been clearly addressed in the previous research (e.g. Garrison & Arbaugh, 2007). The pedagogical essence of collaborative learning is that during discourse students are engaged in building or elaborating knowledge through coordinated efforts (Dillenbourg, Baker, Blaye & O'Malley, 1996). Therefore, Stahl and Hesse (2006) claimed that the term “intersubjective meaning-making” seems to be a more appropriate description than “collaborative learning”. During the process of meaning-making, a group is a learning entity working towards a problem solution, and any individual work during collaboration is more or less interrelated with the other group members. Hence, simply looking into single group member's work is not sufficient to understand how the group jointly elaborates the knowledge and step by step arrives at the final solution (Salomon, 1993). The effectiveness of group problem-solving relies on individual contributions and the responding efforts from his/her group members. Echoing the introduction of measuring students' collaborative problem-solving skills through computer-based interactions in the in- ternational PISA test in 2015, education researchers as well as policy makers have been paying an increasing attention to the theoretical and methodological challenges of knowledge assessment in CSCL (Stahl, Law, & Hesse, 2013). The current research is an exploratory study based on a theoretical notion of our previous studies (Ding, 2009; Ding, Bosker, & Harskamp, 2010). It aims at exploring a method to measure the synchronization of students' epistemic involvement at CSCL. It is named as Epistemic Synchronization Index (ESI). In the following sections, we are going to introduce the theoretical background and development of ESI, followed by a description of the study methods. Subsequently, we will explain the way to calculate ESI and introduce the preliminary results. After that, conclusions will be drawn and the theoretical and practical implications of ESI will be discussed. * Corresponding author. International Business School (IBS), Hanze University of Applied Sciences, P.O. Box 70030, 9704 AAGroningen, The Netherlands. Tel.: þ31 (0)50 595 2346, þ31 (0)61 426 2533 (mobile); fax: þ31 (0)50 595 2370. E-mail address: n.ding@pl.hanze.nl (N. Ding). URL: http://www.hanzeuniversity.eu. Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Computers & Education journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/compedu http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2014.08.004 0360-1315/© 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Computers & Education 80 (2015) 122e131