The Moderating Role of Academic Discipline in Acceptance of Video Technology for Educational Purposes

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the role played by academic discipline differences in terms of their influence on the acceptance of video technology being used for educational purposes by higher education students. The research model was based on Technology Acceptance Model in which academic discipline (hard, pure, soft, applied) was involved as a moderator variable.
Data were collected from 240 students using a questionnaire on which the partial least-squares structural equation modelling and the Henseler's multi-group analysis were used to compare differences among academic discipline-groups. In summary, results show that the degree of importance attached to perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use and attitude toward video use when students explain the intensity of their instructional video usage differs between hard/soft, and pure/applied academic disciplines. In the case of hard-pure subjects (e.g. natural sciences) and hard-applied subjects (e.g. engineering or computer science) the intensity of video usage, as a learning resource, is mostly determined by the students' expectations in relation to the effortlessness (or otherwise) of learning with videos. In the case of soft-pure subjects (such as sociology) and soft-applied subjects (such as law and business studies) positive/negative feelings associated with video usage also play an important role in the intensity of video usage as a learning resource. The degree to which a student believes that using videos would enhance his or her learning has a stronger influence on the intensity of video usage in the case of soft-pure subjects than in the case of soft-applied subjects.