Barriers to studying online for the first time: Students' perceptions Chris Lund Australian Cooperative Research Centre for Renewable Energy and Simone Volet School of Education Murdoch University

Many tertiary institutions and individual staff members are now embracing the Internet as a new method of course delivery and are rushing to put part or all of their courses "on the web" (online). Yet, major issues related to teaching and learning with this new mode of learning are not fully understood. In particular, little is known about the barriers students face when studying online for the first time. This paper presents the preliminary results of a larger study exploring students' perceptions and experience of this new mode of study. The sample included 86 students studying "fully online" in one of their units of study (several disciplines), and 365 studying either partly online or in a conventional mode of study in the same units. The data involved one questionnaire given to all students at the beginning of the semester, and mid-semester interviews with 20 "fully online" students. The background profile of "volunteers" and "'non volunteers" to study online, in terms of age, gender, discipline, year of study, as well as experience in using computers and computer technology, are compared. Interview data reveals students' reflection on their experience of learning with online materials and the problems or barriers that they were facing half-way through their first semester of online study.

1. Introduction

A rapidly increasing number of papers are being published showing examples of how online courses can be developed and run (Brown, 1997, Carbone et al., 1997, Casati and Pernici 1996, Laurillard 1993, Neilson et al. 1996). There are also a number of papers about "Keeping Online Students Onside" (Brown and Thompson 1997) showing what constitutes good online course design or practice (Brown 1996, Brown and Thompson 1997, Harasim, 1987, Harasim 1990, Laurillard, 1993, Oliver, et al. 1996). Some research explored the effectiveness of various online teaching methods, such as how to get students to effectively use online discussion groups (Gazzard and Dalziel 1997, Taylor et al. 1997). One major question, however, is whether interactive, online, instructional methods should only be used to supplement traditional instruction, or whether they can effectively replace or even enhance them (Godfrey 1996, Schutte 1997).

One important question about which there appears to be little published research yet is how students themselves feel when they are exposed to online learning for the first time. In particular, little is known about the barriers that students encounter when studying online for the first time. Perceived barriers are "real" barriers for students and thus they need to be identified. Perceived barriers may not only determine whether given the choice, students will select that new mode of learning over conventional methods or not. If these barriers are not addressed students forced to study with online materials may either not learn effectively, or may even drop out of the unit or University altogether. This paper presents the preliminary results of a study directly exploring the issue of barriers encountered by first time users of online units, from the students' perspective.

2. Background

Figure 1: Front page of Murdoch Online web site http://www.murdoch.edu.au/online/

In order to be listed or offered through Murdoch Online individual units not only had to incorporate major components "online" but they also needed to display sound instructional design and pedagogy, and meet a number of quality assurance standards. The definition of "online" used for Murdoch Online units is (Atkinson 1997):

Units classified as available online give online access to a full study guide, including the unit's teaching and learning activities, assignments, and online readings. Instructional designs may be drawn from a variety of models to suit the units curriculum, and the unit may use a range of other kinds of resources such as classroom teaching and text books, in accordance with its mode of study being "distance education" or on "campus".

A pilot study (Lund et al. 1997) of students' perceptions of online study, reasons for volunteering to study online, and barriers to studying online was conducted by the authors during the trialling of one of these Murdoch Online units in 1997. The results of that pilot study highlighted the need for embarking on a more significant study of students' perceptions of studying online and in particular of their perceived barriers to studying online for the first time.

Although a number of the Murdoch Online units had been developed and trialled previously, first semester 1998 was the first time that Murdoch offered a significant number of online units. Therefore, a significant number of students, in a number of different disciplines, were experiencing 'fully online' study for the first time. A "fully online" mode of study meant that students were provided with at least a full study guide, including the unit's teaching and learning activities, assignments and lecture notes on the web. All of the online units had an electronic discussion group, and for some students their comments on this discussion group was part of the assessment, while for others it was informal. All units had the facility to submit and receive marked assignments electronically. Most units also had additional online readings and links to other web sites as part of the required reading for the unit. Some of the units, such as those from Engineering, also had Java simulations and online computer aided learning exercises. All units (except Education) could be completed entirely online without attending the university campus.

3. Study methodology

In the Engineering and Energy Studies units, fully online study was compulsory for all internal students. For all other units studying fully online was organised on a voluntary basis, with the remainder of the students studying the unit predominantly in the conventional mode. For all except one of these other units (Education) most internal students had some online requirement, even though they were studying in predominantly conventional mode. The Engineering unit had internal (on campus) students only, while all the other units also had external (distance education) students, as well as internal students. All external students were given a choice of studying fully online or studying in a conventional mode.

In addition to the questionnaire, 20 students were interviewed in the middle of the semester (week 6). Students were selected from across the range of fields of study. These interviews aim to develop greater insight into students' perceptions of their experience of studying online, and any barriers they were facing.

4. Results and discussion

Fully online student's views of learning with online materials

As shown in Table 1, there were no age-related differences nor any differences related to students' background in the discipline of study. With regard to gender, Male students appeared to have more positive views of learning with online materials than Female students, ie they thought that learning was easier and led to better understanding, more so than Female students. Differences emerged with regard to students' self-reported amount of current computer use and their experience of studying with technology. As expected, students who used computers more frequently, as well as those who indicated they had more experience of studying with technology rated learning online as easier and thought that it led to better understanding. These results suggest that as the exposure of students to computers and the Internet increase at primary and secondary school level, there is likely to be an increase in students perceptions of the usefulness and ease of use of online materials for University study.

Possible differences related to year of study (somehow confounded with age) emerged showing that students in their first year of study perceived learning online to be easier, and leading to better understanding, compared to those in their second or third year. The pattern of difference continued with 4th/5th and postgraduate students who had the least positive views of all the online students. These age and year of study results need, however, to be interpreted with some caution as year of study and age are also confounded with programme of study. There was a higher proportion of 17 to 20 year old Engineering students amongst the group of first year students, and these Engineering students, who studied Software Engineering, had more positive ratings of online study.

Although the number of students is smaller, a less confounded idea of the effect of year of study on student's views of online study, with year of study, can be obtained from a comparison of the first year and second year Economics students, shown in Table 2. In this comparison the effect of programme of study is not confounded with year of study. As the first year unit in this study is a prerequisite for the second year unit, it can be safely assumed that the students taking the second year units are second or third year students.

Table 2 shows that, for the Economics students, there is a difference in students' perceptions about how much studying using online materials will be easier or more difficult, depending on which year they are in. Students enrolled in the first year unit thought that studying using online materials would be less difficult than those who enrolled in the second year unit. In contrast, there were no differences in students' perceptions as to whether it studying online would lead to better or less understanding.

The gender differences in students' perceptions of online study were pursued by exploring whether there were also gender differences within the group of "volunteers" for fully online and "non volunteers". Table 3 shows the profile of the two groups. External students were excluded from the non volunteers group, since their reasons for not volunteering could have been access, rather than choice. In contrast, all internal students had access to laboratory facilities on campus.

As can be seen in Table 3, there was no gender difference with regard to the decision to study a unit in the fully online mode or not. Combined with the gender differences in perceptions, these findings suggest that although Female students were as keen to study in a fully online mode of study as Male students, they thought that online study may be more difficult. These gender-related findings are totally consistent with the results of our previous pilot study of students (Lund et al. 1997) volunteering to take an Energy Studies unit in online mode. In the pilot study, limited to one class of Energy Studies students, no differences were found between the number of Male and Female students who had volunteered to take the unit fully online. However, female students who had volunteered to study online had rated themselves as less confident, at the beginning of the unit, in both the use of computers and in the use of the Internet in general than their Male counterparts.

The possibility that gender-related differences in perceptions of online study could be related to the two groups' respective experience of computing and of studying with technology was explored. No significant differences were found with regard to prior experience of using computers. A marginally significant gender difference was found for experience of studying with technology, with male students reporting more experience (mean value of 2.81) than females (mean value of 2.38). This finding on its own would not be sufficient to explain the differences in perceptions as to whether online study is easier or leads to better understanding. Gender-related differences similar to those found in this study, have been reported in the literature, in the field of Mathematics (eg Clarke & Chambers 1989) and Computer Science (Volet and Lund 1994).

Table 4 shows fully online students' personal views of learning with online materials broken down by fields of study and year of study.

Although the figures seem to suggest differences in perceptions related to fields of study, the small number of students and units within each field preclude any firm interpretation. So far in this research, fields of study and units of study are still confounding factors. With further units surveyed, it will be possible to address the issue of whether science and engineering students may perceive online as easier and leading to better understanding than economics and education / humanities students.

Student's reasons for volunteering to study with online materials or not

All students who volunteered to study fully online were asked to rate how important a number of factors were in their decision to volunteer. These results are shown in Table 5.

As can be seen in Table 5, the most important reason why students volunteered to study fully online was "flexibility in learning times and pace", with 74% of students rating this as very important (mean rating of 4.00). The next most important reason was "interest in this mode of study", also with 74% of students rating this as very important, and a mean rating of 3.88. Next was "guided access to useful web-based resources for the unit" with 67% of students rating this factor as very important (mean rating of 3.74), while 62% of students rated the "convenience of communicating with university staff electronically" as very important (mean rating of 3.57).

The least important reasons for volunteering to study online (rated "very important" by less than 50% of students) were: "no scheduled lectures or tutorials to attend" (mean rating 3.07); "the opportunity to interact with other students via electronic means" (mean rating 3.02); and "the opportunity to study off campus" (mean rating 2.86).

It is clear from the results that students perceive the advantages of studying online to be flexibility in learning pace and time, guided access to useful resources on the web beyond those available in the conventional mode, and the convenience of electronic contact with the university staff. Also, students seem to volunteer to study online because they are interested in this new mode of learning. Freeman (1997) and Keiser and Toreki (1997) have also noted that students see flexibility as one of the main advantages of web-based teaching programs.

In those units where students had a choice of whether to study online or not, those students that chose to study online remained the minority (~12% of students). Obviously, if students perceive that there will be significant barriers to studying online and that their study will suffer accordingly they will not volunteer to study online. It was therefore important to also explore the reasons why students did NOT choose to study online when given the choice. Table 6 shows students' ratings of the factors in making the decision not to volunteer to study online when given a choice of study mode. Table 6 shows the responses separately for internal (on campus) students and external (distance education) students.

From Table 6 it is clear that the main reason internal students did not volunteer to study fully online, and perhaps indirectly what they perceived to be the major barrier with studying online, was that they "preferred face to face contact with university staff". Students may fear that they would lose valuable face to face interactions with university staff if they studied fully online. Sixty eight percent of all students who did not volunteer to study fully online rated "prefer face to face contact with university staff" as very important in their decision not to study fully online, with a mean rating of 3.85. The next most important reason for not volunteering to study fully online, with 59% of students rating it as very important, was that students were "unsure of their ability to study successfully in this mode", with a mean rating of 3.64. The other reasons considered as very important by internal students (rated very important by more than 50% of students) for not studying fully online were: they felt they "study more effectively with face to face contact with other students" (60% of students with a mean rating of 3.61) and they would not have this face to face contact when studying online; restricted or no access to a computer off campus (61% of students with a mean rating of 3.54); and concerns regarding sufficient access to computers on campus (53% of students with a mean rating of 3.45).

From these results the factors perceived by internal students to be barriers to studying online appear to be: loss of face to face contact with university staff and other students; uncertainty about being able to study effectively in the unit using this new mode of learning; and concerns about access to computers both off and on campus. These results were consistent with the results of our pilot study (Lund et al. 1997). In the pilot study, where online study was also voluntary, students who did not choose online study also gave "No access to Internet facilities" and "lack of confidence in using the Internet" as the reasons for not using the online mode of study. The students in the pilot study were not asked about their concerns related to lack of face to face teaching or student contact. The results of the pilot study are therefore consistent with the results of this study, where the second and third most important reasons for not studying online are "uncertainty about being able to study effectively in the unit using the online mode" (lack of confidence), and "lack of access to computers".

The perceived barriers to studying fully online for external (distance education) students were different to those for internal students. Table 6 shows that, as expected, the major perceived barrier to studying fully online for external students, with 66% of students rating it as very important, was "restricted or no access to a computer off campus", with a mean rating of 3.54. As external students do not normally have face to face contact with either teaching staff or other students these two factors were not perceived to be important reasons for not volunteering to study fully online. It can be noted that less than 50% of external students rated "Unsure of ability to study successfully in this mode" as very important in their decision not to study fully online. Again external students are already used to studying in a more independent, non conventional mode, without the lectures, tutorials and face to face contact with teaching staff and students that internal students have access to. Therefore they would be less likely to be unsure of their ability to study successfully in the online mode.

Student's perceptions after some experience of studying online

A number of positive aspects that related to studying online emerged in these interviews, and predominantly correspond to the positive factors identified in Table 5. The most frequently mentioned positive aspects of studying online were: flexibility in learning times and pace; convenient guided access to useful up to date web-based resources for this unit and in particular the extra useful resources available on the Internet; and the convenience of communicating with university staff electronically. One extra advantage mentioned by some students was that studying online enabled or encouraged them to increase their computer and Internet skills.

Typical comments regarding the positive factors of studying online were:

Flexibility in learning times and pace

"Its flexible, I don't have set lectures or tutorials and I can work at my own pace"

"Its convenient, I can work from home."

"Its convenient and flexible. You can study in your own time and stop and go back if you need to go over something."

"You can find alternative information that is not in the text, which helps if you need more information."

"Fast easily available research material."

"There's a lot of information out there and it can be accessed online."

"You have access to more current information and its convenient if you need to use it."

"Email is an advantage - I can send assignments electronically and you can also contact lecturers and tutors without going into Uni. I use email a fair bit."

" Speed of responses from lecturers." (external student)

"Benefit of emailling assignments instead of taking them in."

"If we need to speak to someone we email rather than phone."

"It really helps you become computer literate, seven weeks ago I could just use the computer but I'm pretty literate now."

"Computers will be a prominent feature in the future and need to be taught, especially web access. So it gives valuable experience in that area."

"You can polish up research skills and become more literate with computers."

Some of the typical comments regarding the negative aspects (or barriers) of studying online were:

Lack of access to the unit online materials off campus or on campus

"....I spent time trying to get the thing up and running and I still can't connect. ... Its really disappointing because it would have been good, but as I say, I don't have the time, so I'm doing the unit conventionally...."

".... and the system crashed and we couldn't post to our discussion list which was a problem with such an intense course. One student was having a major anxiety attack because it is his final year and he was worried."

"There aren't enough terminals in the general lab, and we can't access the homepage from the programme lab, which means we waste time waiting for a terminal in the general lab."

"I find it harder because there's no Internet at home, and access at Uni is a big problem."

"Not having contact with other students is difficult sometimes, your very much on your own. The discussion group isn't as good as having tutorials because you don't get the same feedback."

"There's no tutorials, unfortunately tutorials don't translate well onto online."

"A little bit more interaction with lecturer would be nice, I don't like being spoonfed, but people I am contacting are faceless, which can be a bit off putting at times."

"The negatives are where I don't have lectures or tutorials."

"I would prefer face to face contact, because I feel isolated sometimes."

"Online wouldn't be sufficient if there weren't any lectures. There are no deadlines for discussion, as long as it is done by the end of semester. I find it loosely planned."

"I've spoken to one student who has the same problems, we feel as if we're feeling our way, no ones done it before so we're not sure how its going to go."

"I'm not really sure what I need to know, I'm not really sure what's expected.

"The discussion list doesn't have the objectives, because I don't have contact with other students I get confused."

"I compare the lecture notes with the textbook, but online students have to read more because we don't know what is relevant material and what is not really important. Its not stressed. I feel I'm behind but I don't really know. I spoke to the unit coordinator about the course because I don't know how I am going or if I know enough."

"You have to be online for a lot of time, which is tiring...."

"Its tiring looking at the monitor for so long - it takes time to print, so that wastes time, but hard copy is easier to read."

"I also find reading from the computer screen really tiring, and tedious."

One should be very cautious, however, in interpreting the differences regarding the Engineering class as related to field of study, although this factor may play a role as well. The Engineering class was in many ways a special group, which could explain the results reported above. The Engineering group surveyed in this study were first year students in Murdoch's Software Engineering and Process Control Engineering programme. This programme was offered at a satellite campus of the main campus, and the cohort of first year students consisted of only 33 internal students (no distance education students). Unlike their peers studying in (most) other university programmes, these students were all enrolled in the same set of units, and attended the same classes everyday. In addition, and although only one of their units was surveyed in this study, it was compulsory for these students to study almost all of their units "fully online". Finally, and in addition to the online materials being available on the Internet, students also had face to face lectures, tutorials and laboratories. Overall, that means that these students were spending a significant amount of time studying together (up to 60 hours a week according to some students!). These students would therefore have known each other very well, and since the class was relatively small, the staff to student ratio was relatively high, enabling increased face to face contact with the teaching staff.

An additional, critical factor was that for the Engineering students, computers and computer technology are an integral part of their studies and future career. Consequently, and as shown in Tables 1 and 4, these students would be expected to have positive perceptions of studying online. Finally, one should add that the majority of the Engineering students were males within the 17 to 20 year old age group. Although students' background profiles would contribute to their reporting less barriers to studying online, a number of other factors reported by these students in their interviews provided further insight into their greater success at overcoming the barriers to studying online, in comparison to students in the other fields of study.

Lack of access to the unit online materials off campus or on campus, was not a problem for these students. The availability of sufficient terminals at all times was due to the small number of students in the programme, their attendance on a satellite campus, and the available dedicated laboratories for the programme. These students were also able to lease laptop computers from the University. These computers already had all of the necessary software installed and were configured for dialup access from home. Finally, students who had technical problems had ready access to teaching and technical staff. Students' acknowledgment of studying online under the most favorable access conditions are reflected in the following comments:

"Logging on from here is excellent, we have a great system."

"There's no major dramas with accessing terminals or the net...."

"We all help each other, and go into Uni at weekends, its like a study group really. We all also do teamwork on certain projects, yes its good."

"If I have problems I talk to the lecturer or other students. We're very supportive of each other in this course."

"I missed some information that I needed. I just talked to other students. I know everyone in the entire course, so it is easier for us in that respect. I also talk to lecturers if I have any problems as well."

"Online is good for us because we work in a group situation, so we support each other........ We all come into the computer labs to study even the people with laptops, its great."

"If I have problems I talk to the lecturer or other students. We're very supportive of each other in this course."

These are the same strategies proposed by Freeman (1997) who has raised a number of issues that academics and academic mangers seeking to utilise web-based teaching technology to enhance the teaching and learning environment should consider. Two of these relate to the same issues raised by the results in this study. Freeman says that:

"Considerate student communications are still critical to ensuring positive students learning conceptions. Moral support from friends, supervisors and colleagues can go a long way in maintaining enthusiasm as does committed technical support staff who are prepared to minimise downtime."

and

"Ensure efficient, 24-hour, seven-days-a-week access to reliable technology. Early adopters may may tolerate risks of poor service and backup but mainstream users will not."

5. Conclusions

Our preliminary results have shown a number of interesting relationships between students' background profiles such as age, gender, discipline, year of study and experience in using computer technology and their perceptions of studying online. As expected, students' general computer use and prior experience of studying with technology were related to their perceptions of whether studying online would be easier and would lead to better understanding. Students with higher computer use and more experience of studying with technology perceive that studying online will be easier and will lead to better understanding than studying conventionally.

Although not conclusive, the results also suggest that age and year of study - partly a confounding factor - may be related to perceptions of studying online. The older the students and the more advanced in their programme of study, the less likely they seemed to perceive that studying online (for the first time) would be easier and would lead to better understanding. Although older students appeared to have initially less positive appraisals of studying online, it may not necessary follow that they would not perform as well as the younger group. Prior studies with students in introductory programming (Volet and Styles 1992, Volet and Lund 1994) revealed no age-related differences in performance despite mature age students' smaller amount of prior computing experience. Volet and Lund (1994) found that by the end of their second semester of computing study, mature age students had caught up with their initial handicap and were performing better than the group of school leavers.

While students' background in content knowledge, did not appear to affect their perceptions of studying online in that discipline of study, possible differences related to the nature of the discipline, for example Engineering and Energy Studies (physical science subjects) and Economics, Humanities and Education (social science and arts subjects) will need to be explored.

This preliminary study revealed some interesting gender-related differences in perceptions of studying online. While no gender differences were found in the proportion of Male and Female students who volunteered to study online when given a choice compared to those who did not, the perceptions of studying online were different for male and female students. As found in other research involving learning about, or with, technology (Jagacinski et al. 1988, Chambers and Clarke 1989, Volet and Lund 1994) Male students generally had more positive attitudes and felt more confident in comparison to their Female counterparts at the beginning of the unit. In the present study, and although there were no significant differences in students' current use of computers or prior experience of studying using technology, Male students perceived that studying online would be easier and lead to better understanding than did Female students.

By studying the reasons why students volunteered to study online when given a choice of study mode it became clear that, in addition to being interested in this new mode of learning, students perceive the major advantages of studying online to be:

• flexibility in learning pace and time
• guided access to useful resources on the web beyond those available in the conventional mode, and
• the convenience of electronic contact with the university staff.

• loss of face to face contact with university staff and other students
• uncertainty about being able to study effectively in the unit using this new mode of learning, and
• concerns about access to computers both off and on campus.

By interviewing students about their experience after they had been studying online for a few weeks, we were able to ascertain that what students had perceived to be the most positive aspects of studying online at the beginning of the unit had remained more or less the same after a few weeks of study. In addition, students had also realised that studying online had encouraged and enabled them to increase their computing and Internet skills.

Similarly, few changes were noted over time regarding students' perceptions of barriers to studying online. On both occasions, most students reported issues such as difficulty of accessing online materials (both on campus and off campus), reduced face to face contact with teaching staff and other students, and being unsure of how to study using this new method, in particular what was required of them in order to get a good grade in the unit. One barrier which emerged in the interview was the discomfort and difficulty of spending large amounts of time at the computer.

Although most students perceived that there were barriers to studying online, the experience of the group of Engineering students suggest that it is possible to put into place strategies to reduce or overcome these barriers, especially for the internal students. Most important are suitable infrastructure and access to computing facilities as well as opportunities for face to face teacher and peer contact and support. This is supported by the work of Freeman (1997). The significance of peer support in the domain of learning with technology is emphasised in the literature (Laurillard 1993) and Jonassen et al. (1993).

If students are to be required to study using online materials then their perceived barriers have to be successfully addressed, otherwise students may not learn effectively. The present study highlighted what some of these barriers are and how, in a field of study where technology is an integral part of the unit, by using a combination of online and conventional teaching in a socially supportive environment, online learning successfully supplemented and enhanced students' experience of learning.

Acknowledgements

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Chris Lund Australian Cooperative Research Centre for Renewable Energy Murdoch University Murdoch WA 6150, Australia clund@central.murdoch.edu.au Simone Volet School of Education Murdoch University Murdoch WA 6150, Australia volet@central.murdoch.edu.au Please cite as: Lund, C. P. and Volet, S. (1998). Barriers to studying online for the first time: Students' perceptions. In C. McBeath and R. Atkinson (Eds), Planning for Progress, Partnership and Profit. Proceedings EdTech'98. Perth: Australian Society for Educational Technology. http://www.aset.org.au/confs/edtech98/pubs/articles/lund.html