Critically reflective dialogues in learning communities of professionals

Communities in which professionals share and create knowledge potentially
support their continued learning. To realise this potential more fully, members are
required to reflect critically. For learning at work such behaviour has been
described as critically reflective work behaviour, consisting of six aspects:
challenging groupthink, critical opinion sharing, an openness about mistakes,
asking for and giving feedback, experimentation and research utilisation. We
studied whether and how these aspects can be distinguished in dialogues of seven
different communities of veterinary professionals (critically reflective dialogues).
Our exploration of the nature of critically reflective dialogues resulted in an
analytical framework. Within each aspect four different modes of communication
were identified: interactive, on an individual basis, non-reflective and restricted.
We assume that professionals use learning opportunities most in the interactive
mode of communication. The framework was employed to study the extent
to which dialogues showed these modes of critically reflective dialogues.
The results demonstrate that in these communities the modes of communication
within aspects were largely non-interactive (i.e., individual, non-reflective).
The developed framework discriminates between communities in terms of their
critically reflective dialogues. Interventions to improve the effectiveness of
learning communities should focus on enhancement of members addressing each
other’s reasons and reflections.