A Blended Learning System to Improve Motivation, Mood State, and Satisfaction in Undergraduate Students: Randomized Controlled Trial (Preprint)

Abstract

BACKGROUND Smartphone-based learning, or mobile learning (m-learning), has become a popular learning-and-teaching strategy in educational environments. Blended learning combines strategies such as m-learning with conventional learning to offer continuous training, anytime and anywhere, via innovative learning activities. OBJECTIVE The main aim of this work was to examine the short-term (ie, 2-week) effects of a blended learning method using traditional materials plus a mobile app—the iPOT mobile learning app—on knowledge, motivation, mood state, and satisfaction among undergraduate students enrolled in a health science first-degree program. METHODS The study was designed as a two-armed, prospective, single-blind, randomized controlled trial. Subjects who met the inclusion criteria were randomly assigned to either the intervention group (ie, blended learning involving traditional lectures plus m-learning via the use of the iPOT app) or the control group (ie, traditional on-site learning). For both groups, the educational program involved 13 lessons on basic health science. The iPOT app is a hybrid, multiplatform (ie, iOS and Android) smartphone app with an interactive teacher-student interface. Outcomes were measured via multiple-choice questions (ie, knowledge), the Instructional Materials Motivation Survey (ie, motivation), the Profile of Mood States scale (ie, mood state), and Likert-type questionnaires (ie, satisfaction and linguistic competence). RESULTS A total of 99 students were enrolled, with 49 (49%) in the intervention group and 50 (51%) in the control group. No difference was seen between the two groups in terms of theoretical knowledge gain (<i>P</i>=.92). However, the intervention group subjects returned significantly higher scores than the control group subjects for all postintervention assessed items via the motivation questionnaire (all <i>P</i><.001). Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) revealed a significant difference in the confusion and bewilderment component in favor of the intervention group (<i>P</i>=.01), but only a trend toward significance in anger and hostility as well as total score. The intervention group subjects were more satisfied than the members of the control group with respect to five out of the six items evaluated: general satisfaction (<i>P</i><.001), clarity of the instructions (<i>P</i><.01), clarity with the use of the learning method (<i>P</i><.001), enough time to complete the proposed exercises (<i>P</i><.01), and improvement in the capacity to learn content (<i>P</i><.001). Finally, the intervention group subjects who were frequent users of the app showed stronger motivation, as well as increased perception of greater gains in their English-language competence, than did infrequent users. CONCLUSIONS The blended learning method led to significant improvements in motivation, mood state, and satisfaction compared to traditional teaching, and elicited statements of subjective improvement in terms of competence in English. CLINICALTRIAL ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03335397; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03335397

Digital learning designs in physiotherapy education: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

“…The studies included students at the bachelor's/undergraduates (n = 17), master's/ entry level (n = 1) and DPT programme level (n = 4). Of the included studies, ve were from Australia (25)(26)(27)(28)(29), ve from Spain (30)(31)(32)(33)(34), three from Brazil (35)(36)(37), one from Denmark (38) and eight from the USA (39)(40)(41)(42)(43)(44)(45)(46). Seventeen of the studies had an RCT design (25,(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42), and ve were cohorts (26,(43)(44)(45)(46).…”

“…A detailed overview of the included studies is shown in Table 2. For the 10 studies that were similar in terms of design, population, interventions and outcomes, we conducted meta-analyses using RevMan 5.3 software (Cochrane Community worldwide) (27,28,(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(44)(45)(46). Twelve studies were too heterogeneous and were not included in the meta-analyses (25,26,29,(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42)(43).…”

“…The duration of exposure to the digital learning designs ranged from 10 hours to two semesters. In the blended learning designs, 21 studies used different digital learning technology and software-such as interactive websites/apps, multimodal online environments (e.g., videos, animations and gures), recorded videos/lectures/tutorials, simulation learning videos with virtual cases/scenarios, podcasts and educational videogames-to present and facilitate the learning materials and to assess the learning outcomes on practical skills and/or knowledge acquisition (25)(26)(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(42)(43)(44)(45)(46).…”

“…We determined that the overall risk of bias was higher for the cohort studies (26,(43)(44)(45)(46) than the RCTs (25,(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42), (Figure 2). The cohort's studies had a high risk of selection bias and attrition bias.…”

“…The RCTs (25,(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42), had a low or unclear risk of bias in the domains of performance bias, detection bias and reporting bias ( Figure 2). It was not possible to blind the students to the digital learning design interventions.…”