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Abstract
This paper is concerned with identifying ways of facilitating “meaningful disagreement” amongst students in interprofessional online discussion forums. It builds on previous research that identified a trend toward polite agreement and only limited evidence of disagreement in this setting. Given the suggestion that disagreement indicates a deeper level of engagement in group discussion and therefore leads to deeper learning, our aim was to critique the pedagogical approach adopted by analyzing whether we were promoting a particular interprofessional discourse amongst students that favored agreement and therefore limited potential learning. Agreement in this context has been conceptualized as a form of online interprofessional “netiquette” existing amongst participants. Findings suggest that creating an online context for critical discourse is challenging; however, the careful construction of learning outcomes, trigger material/resources and learning activities, as well as attention to students' stage of study and life experience, can provoke the desired effects.