The current study reports the findings of the first step of a comprehensive performance improvement study, identification of the optimal behaviors. In this sense, this study aims to determine the optimal faculty behaviors in distance education based on the perspectives of the stakeholders based on the framework of transactional distance (TD) theory. The data were obtained from the stakeholders of distance education practices; distance education experts from eight universities, and faculty members, administrators, and students from two universities as well as observations on online courses and available relevant documents. The data from the multiple sources were analyzed through constant comparison method. The emerged codes created the themes based on the TD theory. The findings indicated that the identified behaviors, which are student-centered and interrelated in producing the outcomes, are expected from all faculty at varying degrees in any context to manage TD outcomes. The identified behaviors might be used as the performance objectives in faculty professional development studies and practices in distance education.

中文翻译：

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确定最佳教师行为以提高远程教育的绩效

当前的研究报告了综合性能改进研究第一步的发现，即最佳行为的确定。在这种意义上，本研究旨在基于交易距离（TD）理论框架，基于利益相关者的观点来确定远程教育中的最佳教师行为。数据来自远程教育实践的利益相关者；来自八所大学的远程教育专家，以及来自两所大学的教职员工，管理人员和学生，以及对在线课程和相关文件的观察。通过恒定比较方法分析了来自多个来源的数据。出现的代码基于TD理论创建了主题。调查结果表明，确定的行为，希望所有教师在任何情况下都可以不同程度地以学生为中心并在产生成果方面相互联系，以管理TD成果。所确定的行为可以用作教师专业发展研究和远程教育实践中的绩效目标。