| Preamble |
This Chapter is part of the PolyCIVIS Handbook on Participatory Methods for Teaching about the Polycrisis in Higher Education. The objective of this Handbook is to serve as a reference resource for teaching about the polycrisis in Higher Education in a participatory manner, a need which has not only been foreseen by the PolyCIVIS project in its inception phase, but also confirmed and further substantiated in a number of meetings and workshops during the project’s lifetime.
This Handbook is not a coursebook to teach what the polycrisis is, but a methods book, to provide instruments for teaching about the polycrisis in a participatory manner. It is to be made available online as a multimedia live resource, presenting different participatory teaching methods for uptake by the Polycrisis-interested community in Higher Education, together with supporting materials such as method descriptions, references, examples and case studies.
The different methods proposed are presented in one chapter for each group of methods, which also includes, in the digital edition of this Handbook, a live survey to collect peer feedback from the community itself, on the usefulness and ease of use that community members (Higher Education tutors, students, researchers as well as practitioners) may themselves find specific methods to have within, and for, their own contexts and audiences.
| What do we mean by thin participation techniques? |
Cognitive style-based peer reflection and role-play approaches invite students to explore how people think, decide, interpret evidence, respond to uncertainty and collaborate differently. These methods use contrasting mental models, decision styles, stakeholder roles, peer observation, reflective dialogue, simulations and structured feedback. They should not be used to label students permanently or reduce them to personality types. Instead, they help learners notice that crisis responses are shaped by assumptions, values, disciplinary habits, risk tolerance, emotions, power and evidence preferences. For teaching polycrisis, these methods support perspective-taking, metacognition, collaborative judgement and more reflexive decision-making under uncertainty.
| Indicative starter sources for information about these methods |
| Additional sources of information about these methods |
Johnson-Laird, P. N. (1983). Mental models: Towards a cognitive science of language, inference, and consciousness. Harvard University Press.
Senge, P. M. (1990). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. Currency/Doubleday.
Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Klein, G. A. (1999). Sources of power: How people make decisions. MIT Press.
Hammond, J. S., Keeney, R. L., & Raiffa, H. (1999). Smart choices: A practical guide to making better decisions. Harvard Business School Press.
Boud, D. (2001). Peer learning in higher education: Learning from and with each other. Kogan Page.
Falchikov, N. (2001). Learning together: Peer tutoring in higher education. Routledge Falmer.
Poorman, P. B. (2002). Biography and role playing: Fostering empathy in abnormal psychology. Teaching of Psychology, 29(1), 32–36.
https://doi.org/10.1207/S15328023TOP2901_08Wills, S., Leigh, E., & Ip, A. (2011). The power of role-based e-learning: Designing and moderating online role play. Routledge.
Sterman, J. D. (2000). Business dynamics: Systems thinking and modeling for a complex world. McGraw-Hill.
Salas, E., Wildman, J. L., & Piccolo, R. F. (2009). Using simulation-based training to enhance management education and teamwork skills. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 8(4), 559–573.
Crocq, L., Mikolajczak, A., Delhomme, G., & Alard, D. (2016). Training decision-makers: Existing strategies for natural and technological crisis management and specifications of an improved simulation-based tool. Safety Science, 97, 144–153.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssci.2016.04.003Yang, M. M., Yang, F., Cui, T., & Cheng, Y.-C. (2019). Analysing the dynamics of mental models using causal loop diagrams. Australian Journal of Management, 44(3), 375–396.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0312896218823831Topping, K. (2009). Peer assessment. Theory into Practice, 48(1), 20–27.
https://doi.org/10.1080/00405840802577569Falchikov, N., & Goldfinch, J. (2000). Student peer assessment in higher education: A meta-analysis comparing peer and teacher marks. Review of Educational Research, 70(3), 287–322.
https://doi.org/10.3102/00346543070003287Double, K. S., McGrane, J. A., & Hopfenbeck, T. N. (2020). The impact of peer assessment on academic performance: A meta-analysis of control group studies. Educational Psychology Review, 32(2), 481–509.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-019-09510-3Nicol, D. J., & Macfarlane-Dick, D. (2006). Formative assessment and self-regulated learning: A model and seven principles of good feedback practice. Studies in Higher Education, 31(2), 199–218.
https://doi.org/10.1080/03075070600572090Gehlbach, H., Brinkworth, M. E., King, A. M., Hsu, L. M., McIntyre, J., & Rogers, T. (2015). Many ways to walk a mile in another's moccasins. Teachers College Record, 117(2), 1–29.
https://doi.org/10.1177/016146811511700204Zimmerman, B. J. (2002). Becoming a self-regulated learner: An overview. Theory into Practice, 41(2), 64–70.
https://doi.org/10.1207/s15430421tip4102_2Hattie, J., & Donoghue, G. M. (2016). Learning strategies: A synthesis and conceptual model. npj Science of Learning, 1, Article 16013.
https://doi.org/10.1038/npjscilearn.2016.13| Indicative participatory teaching scenarios for these methods |
Students analyse the same crisis scenario from different cognitive and disciplinary frames: economist, ecologist, public-health official, activist, local resident, journalist, emergency planner and student. Each group maps what its role notices, ignores, values and fears. The class compares how mental models shape crisis interpretation.
Students respond to a simulated crisis using contrasting decision styles: risk-averse planner, rapid innovator, consensus-builder, justice advocate, data maximalist, precautionary ethicist and political pragmatist. After the role-play, peers analyse how each style shaped speed, inclusion, evidence use and unintended consequences.
After a group task, students do not immediately present the solution. Instead, they analyse how their group reached it: who framed the problem, whose evidence counted, what assumptions dominated, who hesitated, and what conflict was avoided. Peer observers provide structured feedback on reasoning and participation.
Students form an emergency cabinet responding to simultaneous heat, misinformation, food-price shocks and public mistrust. Each student receives both an institutional role and a decision-style card. The dual-role design helps students see how organisational responsibility and cognitive preference interact.
Students identify common decision biases in crisis response, such as confirmation bias, urgency bias, optimism bias, authority bias or availability bias. In pairs, they rehearse how to interrupt these biases respectfully during group decision-making.
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