An Assessment Of E-Learning Adoption In Universities: Evidence From A Developing Country

ABSTRACT Electronic learning (e-learning) has come to revolutionize the way students receive educational information from their teachers/instructors and it is ushering in a new era of active and creative thinkers and students. This has spurned on a lot of interest in the field of Information Systems research which has led to researchers looking at factors that either support or inhibit the adoption of e-learning with little focus on the influence of moderating factors on these adoption factors. It is in this vein that this study sought to research into the factors that explain the acceptance of the University of Ghana Sakai Learning Management System (LMS) and also look at the effects of gender and age as moderating variables on these adoption factors. The Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model was therefore adopted to be used as the guiding lens for the study after a rigorous review of e-learning literature. The UTAUT model was selected because it is proven to be able to better explain the discrepancy in usage intention than previous acceptance models. Using the quantitative survey research approach, four hundred and five (405) students enrolled in University of Ghana Sakai LMS answered the questionnaire which was based on the four traditional constructs of the UTAUT model (Performance Expectancy, Effort Expectancy, Social Influence and Facilitating Conditions). Multiple regression analysis was therefore carried out on the collected data. The results showed that the intention to use the Sakai LMS was directly influenced by performance expectancy, social influence and facilitating conditions. Again, it was revealed that only the age variable had a moderating effect on student’s intention to use the Sakai LMS and even with this the moderation was only statistically significant on Performance Expectancy and Facilitating Conditions. Gender on the other hand, did not moderate any of the factors. These findings tend to iterate previous research which established that younger students are more likely to be receptive to new technologies such as e-learning and further, in an educational context, these new technologies are more likely to be receptive to both gender, with no significant differences in adoption. These findings do not only add to the scientific literature on e-learning and technology adoption, but it also leads to a better practical understanding of the factors, especially from a developing African country, that may incite or discourage students to use online technologies in higher education especially in developing countries. Previous e-learning research in developing African countries have often been silent on moderating factors such as age and gender. Faculty members and administrators should use these results to develop strategies to align users’ expectations with the use of technology for learning.