transfer 20(1) » Medienpädagogik

Students’ media use and multitasking behavior in class:

Perspectives of university instructors about its impacts on the educational environment

This study aims to explore (1) the implications to the learning environment that university instructors identify in students’ media use behavior during class, (2) how favorable instructors’ attitudes are concerning students’ media use behavior, and (3) which instructors’ characteristics influence their attitudes towards the mentioned behavior.
Applying the three-component model of attitudes (Rosenberg & Hovland, 1960), university instructors’ attitudes were investigated in implicit (cognitive + affective) and behavioral terms. A mixed methods strategy was adopted, in which data was gathered in the qualitative phase via interviews, which informed the survey that was used as method of data collection in the quantitative phase.
Findings illustrate aspects instructors consider being positively and negatively related to students’ media use behavior, showing that most instructors have favorable implicit and behavioral attitudes towards this phenomenon in general.
Pearson correlation coefficient tests demonstrated that positive implicit attitudes were positively related to instructors’ familiarization of media devices and negatively to the use of lectures for academic teaching. By evaluating the implications of students’ media use in university classes from the perspective of lecturers, this study provides an update of what it is like teaching digital natives, and contributes to the discussion about the necessity of changes in pedagogy for achieving a more adequate educational system.
Die Arbeit ist in englischer Sprache verfasst.