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Promotion and prevention orientations in the choice to attend lectures or watch them online
Author(s) -
Bassili J. N.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
journal of computer assisted learning
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.583
H-Index - 93
eISSN - 1365-2729
pISSN - 0266-4909
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2729.2006.00192.x
Subject(s) - the internet , promotion (chess) , psychology , neuroticism , openness to experience , personality , social psychology , computer science , world wide web , politics , political science , law
When presented with the option to use a new instructional technology, students often face an approach–avoidance conflict. This study explored promotion and prevention orientations, concepts linked to approach and avoidance in Higgins's regulatory focus theory, in the choice to attend lectures or watch them online. Openness, a core disposition in the Big Five Model of personality, and positive attitudes towards the utility of the Internet, reflect promotion orientations that are potentially related to the choice to watch lectures online. By contrast, neuroticism, another core disposition in the Big Five Model, and anxiety about the Internet as a computer technology, reflect a prevention orientation that is potentially related to the choice of attending lectures in class. The results illustrate that both promotion and prevention are at work in the choice to attend lectures or to watch them online. Neuroticism and anxiety about the Internet as a computer technology were related to the choice to attend lectures in class, whereas the perceived utility of the Internet was related to the choice to watch lectures online. Instructional mode choice was not related to examination performance, suggesting that the choice to attend lectures or watch them online has more to do with individual differences in promotion and prevention orientations than with pedagogical characteristics that impact learning.