Exploring Undergraduate Students’ Digital Multitasking in Class: An Empirical Study in China

Abstract

UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development highlights the crucial role of education in securing a promising future for humanity, especially in today’s digital era. However, the prevalence of smartphones has fostered an increase in students’ usage and subsequent digital multitasking tendencies, posing a significant threat to education process, especially in higher education. To gain further insights into this phenomenon, this exploratory descriptive study surveyed 519 students from China university to investigate the magnitude of students’ digital multitasking, motivation behind digital multitasking, and beliefs about reducing phone use. The study found that, (1) despite many respondents reporting the existence of phone limits, no possible reduction in phone use frequency was observed; (2) digital multitasking was positively correlated with mobile phone dependence and non-study motivation; (3) while a majority (86.71%) students expressed their intent to reduce digital multitasking, they were mostly hesitant to follow the moderate or strict rules on phone use; (4) no clear consensus was established (49.90% vs. 50.10%) regarding whether schools should pose more restrictions to encourage such reduction. Our research provides further insights into students’ digital multitasking to improve learning quality and sustainable education.

Beyond the Books: Exploring Factors Shaping Chinese English Learners’ Engagement with Large Language Models for Vocabulary Learning

“…Lastly, learners should be mindful of their autonomy, competence, and relatedness needs, actively engaging with learning activities that satisfy these psychological drivers to maintain motivation and persistence in learning English vocabulary [37]. In this sense, learners could select personalized vocabulary exercises (autonomy), take on level-appropriate challenges through adaptive quizzes (competence), and connect with a learning community to share insights (relatedness), thus bolstering their motivation and enduring engagement with English vocabulary learning [38][39][40].…”

How does organizational polychronicity relate to individual adaptive performance? A conservation of resources perspective

“…In the digital era, the development of technology has made it easier for individuals to multitask or switch tasks (Wang et al, 2023), which provides organizations with opportunities to assign employees multiple jobs to reduce costs and improve efficiency (Asghar et al, 2021). Moreover, the implementation of information technology has improved work efficiency (Asghar et al, 2021), but it has also caused employees to frequently interrupt or switch tasks, which has led to the paradox of multitasking and concentration (Jokinen et al, 2020).…”

“…In the digital era, the development of technology has made it easier for individuals to multitask or switch tasks (Wang et al. , 2023), which provides organizations with opportunities to assign employees multiple jobs to reduce costs and improve efficiency (Asghar et al.…”