Global Pandemic Prevention Continual Learning—Taking Online Learning as an Example: The Relevance of Self-Regulation, Mind-Unwandered, and Online Learning Ineffectiveness

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The study investigates  the correlation among the six different domains of self-regulation, mind-unwandered, and perceived online learning ineffectiveness. Altough there is a solid literature about the topic, the novelty resides in the fact the study was conducted during the COVID-19 period.

As shown, the findings are helpful to the teachers and other educational actors in understanding the influence of different phases of self-regulation on learners' perceived ineffectiveness when facing the pandemic in a specific learning environment.

Author Response

1: I don't feel qualified to judge about the English language and style

Thanks for this comment; we have had an experienced native English speaker proofread the manuscript again.

2: The study investigates the correlation among the six different domains of self-regulation, mind-unwandered, and perceived online learning ineffectiveness. Although there is a solid literature about the topic, the novelty resides in the fact the study was conducted during the COVID-19 period.

Thanks indeed for this supporting comment.

3: As shown, the findings are helpful to the teachers and other educational actors in understanding the influence of different phases of self-regulation on learners' perceived ineffectiveness when facing the pandemic in a specific learning environment.

Thank you very much for this supporting comment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This quantitative study explored the structural relations among  online self-regulated learning, mind-unwandering and learning ineffectiveness during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is an interesting and timely research. However, there are still several issues that the authors need to address before publication.

First, I was not satisfied by the current literature review. More closely related and recent studies about online SRL should be included. More importantly, a clear definition of mind-unwandering and online learning ineffectiveness should be provided and related previous research should be added to improve the academic significance of these two key constructs.

Second, the authors reported 541 questionnaires were compiled but there were 166 invalid ones. Why the ratio of invalid questionnaires is so high? The high ratio may also imply the potential flaw of the surveying process.

The authors did not fully elaborate how they design the items or how they adapted the survey from the established instruments. They only conducted the CFA which may become a critical issue for proving the validity and reliability of the measurements. As for newly-design surveys,  both EFA and CFA are usually required.

The discussion needs further improvement for co-relating the current findings with previous findings and elaborating the theoretical contributions of the investigation.

Author Response

Reply to Reviewer 2 Comments

This quantitative study explored the structural relations among  online self-regulated learning, mind-unwandering and learning ineffectiveness during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is an interesting and timely research. However, there are still several issues that the authors need to address before publication.

1: First, I was not satisfied by the current literature review. More closely related and recent studies about online SRL should be included. More importantly, a clear definition of mind-unwandering and online learning ineffectiveness should be provided and related previous research should be added to improve the academic significance of these two key constructs.

Thank you for this comment. We rewrote the descriptions of these two constructs. Please see pages 2 to 3 for corrections.

2: Second, the authors reported 541 questionnaires were compiled but there were 166 invalid ones. Why the ratio of invalid questionnaires is so high? The high ratio may also imply the potential flaw of the surveying process.

Sorry, that was a typo, it should be 441 questionnaires were collected, 66 of which were invalid. Please see page 6 for corrections. Please see page 6 for corrections.

3: The authors did not fully elaborate how they design the items or how they adapted the survey from the established instruments. They only conducted the CFA which may become a critical issue for proving the validity and reliability of the measurements. As for newly-design surveys, both EFA and CFA are usually required.

Confirmatory research is to test the validity of an existing hypothesis, known as an a priori hypothesis. This means that possibly some previous studies have been carried out on the subject matter. The confirmatory research method is normally based on previous studies, and aims to confirm an existing result or theory. Besides, in confirmatory (also called hypothesis-testing) research, the researcher has a specific idea about the relationship between the variables under investigation and is trying to see if hypotheses are supported by data (Butler, 2014). That is, if testing a new instrument, EFA and CFA are performed most often; but the focus of this study was on performing confirmatory research by using previous instruments to test their suitability for conducting structure equation modeling. Thus, to test the hypothetical model of this study, we used CFA and structual equation modeling to analyze path coefficient correlations.

Butler, R. G. (2014). Exploratory vs confirmatory research. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/267058525

4: The discussion needs further improvement for co-relating the current findings with previous findings and elaborating the theoretical contributions of the investigation.

The research model of this study divided “before” and “after” for exploring students’ engagement in online learning. This research model can be considered as a new design for examining SRL mediated by mind-unwandered. However, few studies have been extended to examine our research model, so we had some difficulties citing related studies. Anyway, we have rewritten the whole of the Discussion section. Please see pages 10 to 11 for corrections.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The study on this topic is very interesting. The structure is clearly and logical and challenging. The research is timely and worthwhile. The authors provide fresh insight into the field.

The article suggests a current and attractive topic for the academy. The effort made is evident, but it requires some adjustments for better understanding and quality.

Authors should follow the style of a structured abstract, which is based on the IMRAD structure of a paper. The abstract should state briefly the purpose of the research, the principal results, and major conclusions. An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it must be able to stand alone.

I hope you find the following observations helpful:

Materials and methods: I found this section very important for the readability of the paper. Methods should be described in detail. I think the research procedure could be much more clearly described by means of a diagram also highlighting its potential and limit.

The references, although varied, are up to date. Which says a lot.

Authors should take into account more previous works (e.g. theoretical, conceptual, and empirical reviews) published in the literature. Authors should discuss the results and how they can be interpreted from the perspective of previously published studies.

The diagrammatic presentation of the study research will be the strongest section of this work. I suggest adding a visual presentation of obtained outcomes in section Results.

I also suggest a grammar and spelling review. 

The conclusion is thorough.

Congratulations on a job well done.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer, 

Reply to your comments point by point as follows, and the amendments are attached to the file, please review again, thank you.

1: The study on this topic is very interesting. The structure is clearly and logical and challenging. The research is timely and worthwhile. The authors provide fresh insight into the field.

Thank you for this constructive comment.

2: The article suggests a current and attractive topic for the academy. The effort made is evident, but it requires some adjustments for better understanding and quality.

Thank you for this comment; we have followed your suggestion to revise.

3: Authors should follow the style of a structured abstract, which is based on the IMRAD structure of a paper. The abstract should state briefly the purpose of the research, the principal results, and major conclusions. An abstract is often presented separately from the article, so it must be able to stand alone.

Thank you for this comment; we have followed your suggestions to revise. Please see page 1 for corrections.

4: Materials and methods: I found this section very important for the readability of the paper. Methods should be described in detail. I think the research procedure could be much more clearly described by means of a diagram also highlighting its potential and limit.

Thank you for suggesting that we revise this section; please see P5.

5: The references, although varied, are up to date. Which says a lot.

Thank you for this supporting comment.

6: Authors should take into account more previous works (e.g. theoretical, conceptual, and empirical reviews) published in the literature. Authors should discuss the results and how they can be interpreted from the perspective of previously published studies.

Thank you for this constructive comment; we have tried to cite as many previous studies as possible. Please see pages 2 to 3 and 10 to 11 for corrections.

7: The diagrammatic presentation of the study research will be the strongest section of this work. I suggest adding a visual presentation of obtained outcomes in section Results.

Thank you for this suggestion; we have presented the results in Figure 2 on page 9.

8: I also suggest a grammar and spelling review.

Thank you for this suggestion; we have had an experienced native English speaker proofread the manuscript again.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf