Social factors affecting students’ acceptance of e-learning environments in developing and developed countries

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this study is to propose a conceptual model investigating the impacts of three social factors (i.e. interpersonal influence, external influence and instructor influence) on students’ intention to use e-learning in two different countries: Egypt as an example of a developing country and the UK as an example of a developed country. Design/methodology/approach The subjects of this study were hospitality and tourism students enrolled in “technology-enhanced” courses that were augmented using an online course management tool within face-to-face settings. A total of 700 e-mails were sent to invite students to participate in the survey. Accordingly, 468 usable responses were obtained, representing a response rate of 66.9 per cent. The structural equation modeling approach was used to estimate the conceptual model. Findings The research results show that interpersonal influence, external influence and instructor quality had significant effects on the Egyptian students’ behavioral intention to use e-learning platforms through the mediating variables of perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness. However, instructor quality was the only predictor which had significant impact on the UK students’ behavioral intention. Research limitations/implications There are three limitations in this study related to the selected sample, the investigated factors and the used research method. Practical implications The findings of the current study offer practical implications for scholars and practitioners in both countries to place a high priority on enhancing e-learning environments. Originality/value The current study contributes to the limited literature about the rule of social factors in technology adoption and use, especially in the context of developing countries such as Egypt.

Evaluating E-learning systems success: An empirical study

“…However, the instructor's communication, responsiveness, and attitude toward the e-learning system did not affect students' usage of the system. This result contradicts prior studies where support was found on the relationship between the instructor and usage or intention to use the e-learning system (Abbas, 2016;Lee et al, 2009;Nair et al, 2015). However, it is consistent with Zhao et al (2019) where no support was found between instructor and continued use intention.…”

Acceptability and Use of Interactive Voice Response Mobile Phone Surveys for Noncommunicable Disease Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance in Rural Uganda: Qualitative Study

“…Moreover, including information on who is sponsoring the survey and offering a phone number for participants to call and verify the survey source may help improve participation. Our findings are similar to others who have explored acceptance of e-interventions such as students’ use of e-learning platforms [37] and the general population’s use of e-banking [38]. The use of financial incentives has been found to increase the behavioral intentions of students, farmers, and the general population to adopt a new technology [39-41].…”

Investigating a theoretical framework for e-learning technology acceptance

“…With the adoption of TAM, the critical factors for the acceptance of E-learning had been identified by several researchers [24,[54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62]. Regarding this study, the goal was to analyze the E-learning acceptance behavior of the UAE University students, through whom, better understandings of implications to implement E-learning systems in UAE universities successfully could be gained.…”