Date of Award
Fall 12-14-2019
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctorate of Education, Ed.D.
College
College of Education
Department
Education
First Advisor
Donna Graham, Ph.D.
Second Advisor
Jean Swenk, Ph.D.
Third Advisor
Michael Hollis, Ph.D.
Abstract
The importance of online learning in higher education has increased considerably over the last two decades. As a result, online learning has become an important area of research. The purpose of the study was to examine if higher levels of computer self-efficacy (CSE) contributed to online course completion among online California community college students. Guided by Bandura’s (1977) work on self-efficacy and the work of Compeau and Higgins (1995) and Howard (2014) on computer self-efficacy, this study revealed that there is no relationship between high levels of CSE and successful completion of the course. A judgement sample was used to select five online sections from a northern California community college in which 122 students participated. These students completed a Computer User Self-efficacy questionnaire which consisted of 12 questions on a six-point Likert scale as well as three questions regarding their perceived use of computers. Spearman’s Correlation Coefficient was conducted to see if a relationship existed between high levels of computer self-efficacy and course grades. The results showed that there was no statistically significant relationship between high levels of computer self-efficacy and course grades. The implication of this study suggests that computer self-efficacy may not be an important factor for today’s digital learner.