Do UOC students fit in the Net Generation profile? An approach to their habits in ICT use

Abstract

Some authors have stated that university students born after 1982 have been profoundly influenced by digital technologies, showing different characteristics when compared to previous generations. However, it is worth asking if that is a current observable phenomenon. Are those students born after the 80s really more familiar with ICT tools than those born in previous generations? Do they show different study habits and learning paths? Different research lines (Kennedy, et al., 2010;Bennett, Maton, & Kervin, 2008; Gros, García, & Escofet, 2012) highlight that scientific data is rarely used when discussing this generation's characteristics; however, none of them have proved in statistical terms that college students do not fit in the Net Generation characteristics and that their habits of ICT use in social and professional activities do not differ from older generations. The international research project, Digital Learners in Higher Education, seeks to develop a sophisticated and evidence-based understanding of university learners in different institutional contexts and the perception of cultures in their use of technology in a social and educational context. Data has been collected from four institutions in Canada and Spain: the British Columbia Institute of Technology, the University of Regina, the Open University of Catalonia (UOC), and the University Rovira i Virgili. In order to develop this project, we used a multi-case study embedded design (Yin, 2009). The UOC's case is deeply analysed in this paper to affirm that the Net Generation is more speculative than real and that includes students' perception about this phenomenon, and guidelines are proposed in an eLearning context.

Students in higher education: Social and academic uses of digital technology

“…This script was adapted and translated into Spanish by experts at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC), and the terminology was adapted to the URV educational model. Detailed information on the content validation criteria is provided in Romero et al (2013). The questions focused on attempting to identify the digital technologies that students use for academic and social purposes, and how, why and where they use them.…”

“…However, the assumption that there is a generation of young people -born between 1980 and 1994 -who are characterized by their familiarity and confidence with digital technologies, and who have different learning styles and behavioural characteristics, has been called into question internationally on the basis of rigorous studies by Bennett, Maton and Kervin (2008), Pedró (2009), Brown and Czerniewicz (2010), Corrin, Lockyer and Bennett (2010), Helsper and Eynon (2010), Kennedy, Judd, Dalgarno and Waycott (2010), Bullen, Morgan and Qayyum (2011), Rapetti (2012), and Romero, Guitert, Sangrà and Bullen (2013). Indeed, some of these studies suggest that students of the same age vary greatly in the way they use technology.…”

Are Malaysian Undergraduates ‘Digital Natives’ in the True Sense of the Word? A Quantitative Analysis

“…They blamed this situation on the school"s failure to develop their abilities as well as their own affinity towards ICT that resulted in laziness on their part which led to deteriorating learning skills. In Spain, Romero, Guitert, Sangrá, and Bullen (2013) did not find much difference between the characteristics of the students characterised as the "Net Generation" (NG) and the non-NG. The patterns of technology use for academic and recreational purposes between the two groups did not differ much.…”

The Learning Preferences of Digital Learners in K-12 Schools in China

“…Some researchers argued beyond the debate for empirical research on the impact of technology on today's learner (Bennett and Maton, 2010;Thomas, 2011;Gros, Garcia, and Escofet, 2012). A growing body of theoretical and empirical research aimed to identify characters of young people's experience with technology and the factors influenced the habits in ICT use (Romero et al, 2013;Corrin, Bennett, and Lockyer, 2013;Varela-Candamio, Novo-Corti, and Barreiro-Gen, 2014;Demirbilek, 2014). Considering the Chinese new generation of learners, Li and Ranieri (2010) provided some evidence on the digital competence status of a group of Chinese teenagers (ninth grade students) from Zhejiang Province, China.…”

“…These researchers believed that this digital generation of learners preferred active rather than passive learning, preferred using digital technologies and collaborating to finish work. However, researchers like Bennett, Maton, and Kervin (2008), Selwyn (2009), Jones, Ramanau, Cross, andHealing (2010) and Romero, Guitert, Sangrà, and Bullen (2013) had argued that although digital technologies were associated with significant changes in the lives of young people, there was no evidence of a serious break between young people and the rest of society.…”