Exploring the Factors Associated with Undergraduate Students’ Online Learning Anxiety: Development of the Online Learner Anxiety Scale

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to explore the factors associated with online learning anxiety by carefully designing, developing, and providing preliminary validity and reliability evidence of a scale to measure undergraduate students’ online learning anxiety. We created a conceptual framework to organize the literature surrounding online learning anxiety and used this framework to develop an initial item pool of 30 items. The researchers recruited N = 297 undergraduate student participants from four public universities in the southeastern United States from whom we collected and analyzed data for descriptive statistics, internal consistency reliability, exploratory factor analysis, and correlational analysis. Following systematic analytic procedures, we arrived at a three-factor model explaining approximately 65% of the variability in these data and retained 24 items in the final model with minimal cross-loadings in the pattern matrix. We labeled the identified factors as (1) online learner feelings of negativity and inadequacy, (2) online learner apprehension towards personal communication, and (3) online learner discomfort with instructor capacity and communication. The final instrument was named the Online Learner Anxiety Scale (OLAS). Scores on the OLAS were correlated with five other measures hypothesized to relate to online learning anxiety thereby providing stronger construct validity evidence. The OLAS was found to produce reliable scores that can be validly inferred as measures of online learning anxiety among undergraduate students in institutions of higher education. These findings are discussed and framed in light of current literature on online learning and possible future research directions.

Encouraging Interaction to Promote Learner Engagement in an Online Blended Learning Course Based on ZOOM, CNMOOC, and CANVAS

“…This is probably due to the issue of "transactional distance," a psychological distance that may lead to students' misunderstanding of their teachers and that may extend with a lengthened physical distance in online contexts [35], p. 23. Without effective interactive designs that inspire communication across the "transactional distance," misunderstanding may accumulate in distance learning, blended learning, and flipped classrooms to the extent where learners no longer believe in their teachers, lose interest in course contents, and experience negative feelings of anxiety, helplessness, and isolation [36]. Hence, interaction can be closely associated with engagement in online learning.…”

“…Regarded as the most important interaction type among the three, teacher-student interaction can greatly influence students' engagement in learning as well as final performance [38]. Teachers may provide direct support after immediate contact with students who encounter content or technical problems, so that they could avoid too much anxiety that possibly results in low engagement [36]. Under emergent circumstances such as the lockdown during COVID-19, social presence of teachers and students can be critical to keeping students socially and affectively engaged in online courses, and teachers should stay connected and take the initiative to sustain a stable online learning community especially during the crisis [39].…”

How Anxious are Online ESP Learners? Exploring Students’ Anxiety in Video, Audio and Text-Based Communication in an Online Classroom

“…Compared to other anxiety measuring instruments, such as the Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale -FLCAS (Horwitz et al, 1986) or the Public Speaking Class Anxiety Scale -PSCAS (Yaikhong & Usaha, 2012), all of which explore a broader classroom context, the current instrument seemed most suitable for this study as it focuses on the situational component of FLA. Conversely, focusing on online learning anxiety, the questionnaire by Alibak et al (Online Test Anxiety Inventory -OTAI, 2019) addresses apprehensive feelings experienced during testing, which was not included in the scope of this research. At this point it is also necessary to address the fact that since the data for this research were collected (April-May 2021) at least one new questionnaire exploring the factors associated with students' online learning anxiety was developed (Online Learner Anxiety Scale -OLAS, Ritzhaupt et al, 2022). However, although focusing on the construct under investigation and very detailed, the instrument does not address the central issue of the present study, i.e., students' anxiety in relation to the three modalities of online communication.…”