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Computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students

BACKGROUND: At the Medical University of Vienna, most information for students is available only online. In 2005, an e-learning project was initiated and there are plans to introduce a learning management system. In this study, we estimate the level of students' computer skills, the number of s...

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Autores principales: Link, Thomas Michael, Marz, Richard
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2006
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1534040/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16784524
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1472-6920-6-34
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author Link, Thomas Michael
Marz, Richard
author_facet Link, Thomas Michael
Marz, Richard
author_sort Link, Thomas Michael
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: At the Medical University of Vienna, most information for students is available only online. In 2005, an e-learning project was initiated and there are plans to introduce a learning management system. In this study, we estimate the level of students' computer skills, the number of students having difficulty with e-learning, and the number of students opposed to e-learning. METHODS: The study was conducted in an introductory course on computer-based and web-based training (CBT/WBT). Students were asked to fill out a questionnaire online that covered a wide range of relevant attitudes and experiences. RESULTS: While the great majority of students possess sufficient computer skills and acknowledge the advantages of interactive and multimedia-enhanced learning material, a small percentage lacks basic computer skills and/or is very skeptical about e-learning. There is also a consistently significant albeit weak gender difference in available computer infrastructure and Internet access. As for student attitudes toward e-learning, we found that age, computer use, and previous exposure to computers are more important than gender. A sizable number of students, 12% of the total, make little or no use of existing e-learning offerings. CONCLUSION: Many students would benefit from a basic introduction to computers and to the relevant computer-based resources of the university. Given to the wide range of computer skills among students, a single computer course for all students would not be useful nor would it be accepted. Special measures should be taken to prevent students who lack computer skills from being disadvantaged or from developing computer-hostile attitudes.
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spelling pubmed-15340402006-08-09 Computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students Link, Thomas Michael Marz, Richard BMC Med Educ Research Article BACKGROUND: At the Medical University of Vienna, most information for students is available only online. In 2005, an e-learning project was initiated and there are plans to introduce a learning management system. In this study, we estimate the level of students' computer skills, the number of students having difficulty with e-learning, and the number of students opposed to e-learning. METHODS: The study was conducted in an introductory course on computer-based and web-based training (CBT/WBT). Students were asked to fill out a questionnaire online that covered a wide range of relevant attitudes and experiences. RESULTS: While the great majority of students possess sufficient computer skills and acknowledge the advantages of interactive and multimedia-enhanced learning material, a small percentage lacks basic computer skills and/or is very skeptical about e-learning. There is also a consistently significant albeit weak gender difference in available computer infrastructure and Internet access. As for student attitudes toward e-learning, we found that age, computer use, and previous exposure to computers are more important than gender. A sizable number of students, 12% of the total, make little or no use of existing e-learning offerings. CONCLUSION: Many students would benefit from a basic introduction to computers and to the relevant computer-based resources of the university. Given to the wide range of computer skills among students, a single computer course for all students would not be useful nor would it be accepted. Special measures should be taken to prevent students who lack computer skills from being disadvantaged or from developing computer-hostile attitudes. BioMed Central 2006-06-19 /pmc/articles/PMC1534040/ /pubmed/16784524 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1472-6920-6-34 Text en Copyright © 2006 Link and Marz; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0) ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Link, Thomas Michael
Marz, Richard
Computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students
title Computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students
title_full Computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students
title_fullStr Computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students
title_full_unstemmed Computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students
title_short Computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students
title_sort computer literacy and attitudes towards e-learning among first year medical students
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1534040/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16784524
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1472-6920-6-34
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