Date of Award
2003
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Fischler Graduate School of Education and Human Services
Advisor
Todd A. Curless
Committee Member
A. Jared Bucker
Committee Member
Barbara Packer
Committee Member
Maryellen Maher
Keywords
academic communications, American history, asynchronous communication, attitude change, college students, communication channels, community colleges, computer assisted instruction, computer mediated communication, computers, electronic mail, instructional technology, Internet, learning attitudes, post-course surveys, pre-course surveys, first-year students, student attitudes, technology use, traditional classroom
Abstract
This applied dissertation compared and measured the pre and post-course differences in college students’ attitudes toward the use of e-mail as an ancillary communications channel in an American history class.
Two groups of first-year community college students completed a pre-course survey that measured demographic information, their prior experience with computers and the Internet, and their impression of learning with e-mail as one of their communication channels. A post-course survey was administered at the end of the semester to measure student attitude with or without the intervention to determine if there were any changes. The e-mail group used the online communications intervention while the non e-mail group only met in a traditional class environment.
This study investigated the question: Does the inclusion of e-mail as a communications channel have a positive impact on attitudes toward academic communications? The results of the study showed that the use of e-mail as an asynchronous communications tool had no effect on student attitudes toward e-mail or the course.
Nova Southeastern University is authorized to include abstracts of this study in University publications and to disseminate the applied dissertation upon request.