A study of students' attitudes, perceptions, and expectations toward instructional technology in higher education: A diffusion of innovations

Colleges and universities are charged with taking a proactive stance to meeting the educational needs of students by preparing them to meet the challenges of a global society in the 21st century. The purpose of this study was to describe and analyze the adoption patterns and behavorial characteristics of students' attitudes, perceptions, and expectations toward their new learning environment, associated with the introduction to instructional technology. This correlational study builds and extends on Rogers's (1995) framework of the diffusion of innovations, and students' responses were classified into five adopter categories: innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. The study was conducted at Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia and The University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia with 171 volunteer students taking instructional technology courses. A 40-item survey was used to assess students' beliefs, feelings, and behavioral patterns as a result of integrating instructional technology into the classroom. Results of the study indicated a positive correlation among students' attitudes, perceptions, and expectations toward the infusion of technology in an instructional program and their acceptance of instructional technology. Factors influencing the adoption of instructional technology were time, prior exposure or knowledge, and credit hours of experience. Greater knowledge and use of instructional technology was associated with more favorable attitudes and expectations toward instructional technology. The study suggests that students are highly motivated in their new learning environments and expect educators to incorporate more instructional technology into their pedagogical methods. The study further suggests that instructors dealing with change in educational settings should consider students' behavioral patterns of acceptance when attempting to understand students' adoption of innovativeness in a new learning environment.