An ECM-ISC based Study on Learners’ Continuance Intention toward E-learning

Abstract

E-learning has been developing rapidly in recent years; however, as the student number and market scale are growing fast, there is also a growing concern over the issue of high dropout rates in e-learning. High dropout rate not only harms both education institutions and students, but also jeopardises the development of e-learning systems. Understanding the behavioural mechanism of students’ continuance learning in online programmes would be helpful for reducing the dropout rate. In order to explain students’ continuance intention toward e-learning, his study combines theories from the fields of information management and pedagogy. By adding two constructs, namely academic integration and social integration, from the theories of dropout as antecedent variables, an improved ECM-ISC model for e-learners’ continued learning intention was put forward. Results from structural equation modeling (SEM) demonstrate a stronger explanatory power of the new model. Based on the results from empirical analyses, corresponding suggestions are proposed in the end of this paper.