Students' expectation, satisfaction, and continuance intention to use digital textbooks

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by Prof. Young Ju Joo  (youngju@ewha.ac.kr)

Department of Educational Technology

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​Dr. Young Ju Joo’s most recent publication, “Students' expectation, satisfaction, and continuance intention to use digital textbooks”, investigated the structural relationships among students' expectation, perceived enjoyment, perceived usefulness, satisfaction, and continuance intention to use digital textbooks in middle school, based on Bhattacherjee's (2001) expectation-confirmation model.

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The main focus of this study is to investigate students' intention to use new digital media and a new service in an educational context, not to justify using digital textbooks from teachers’ and policy makers' perspectives. This study confirmed that (a) the more that expectations placed on digital textbooks are satisfied, the higher the perception of enjoyment and usefulness will be, (b) perceived enjoyment and perceived usefulness indirectly affect continuance intention to use digital textbooks by mediating satisfaction, (c) perceived usefulness and satisfaction directly influence continuance intention while perceived enjoyment did not significantly affect continuance intention to use. The findings of the current study supported the following implications.

First, satisfied expectations regarding digital textbooks positively influenced perceived enjoyment, which is supported by previous studies (Kim, 2010; Lin et al., 2005; Shiau & Luo, 2013; Thong et al., 2006). This result implies that expectation can be a predictor of perceived enjoyment in similar technology-integrated learning environments, such as a class using digital textbooks. For instructional design of digital textbooks, unique, enjoyable content should be considered from an early stage. Also, it is important to establish supportive learning environments for students to have a fun experience with the digital textbooks by combining diverse motivational components with multimedia and learning support functions.

Second, the perception of usefulness of digital textbooks was increased when expectations were met. This same finding was found in previous studies (Kim, 2010; Lee, 2010; Lee & Kwon, 2011; Lin et al., 2005; Shiau & Luo, 2013; Thong et al., 2006). This result suggests that expectation can play a critical role in perceiving the usefulness of learning technologies (e.g., digital textbooks) in technology-based learning environments. Considering the relationship between expectation and the perception of usefulness, digital textbooks should be designed to provide useful content and helpful multimedia, which can meet learners' expectations by analyzing the level of their expectations.

Third, expectation, perceived enjoyment, and perceived usefulness positively influenced satisfaction with digital books in digital textbook-integrated classes. In other words, learners with high levels of expectations, perceived enjoyment and perceived usefulness with digital textbooks were more likely to be satisfied with digital textbooks. This finding is in accord with the findings of previous studies (Jung & Jung, 2012; Sørebø et al., 2009). Particularly, the result (expectation is a factor that affects satisfaction more than other factors in the current study) is consistent with the finding from Jung and Jung (2012); that expectation is the most critical factor to use with different types of information systems. The high quality of content and service experienced from digital textbooks should be maintained and enhanced to provide more satisfied outcomes than students expect.

In addition, perceived usefulness and satisfaction positively affected continuance intention towards digital textbooks. The findings in this study indicate that satisfaction is a more powerful factor influencing continuance intention than perceived usefulness, which is supported by Thong et al. (2006). That is to say, even though learners had positive perceptions of digital textbooks at first, they would not continuously use digital textbooks if they became dissatisfied with them. Thus, teachers should consider learner satisfaction first in digital textbook-integrated classes.

On the other hand, perceived enjoyment did not significantly affect continuance intention to use digital textbooks. This finding is not consistent with previous research that claimed a significant influence of perceived enjoyment on continuance intention to use technology (Kim, 2010; Lin et al., 2005). The insignificant influence of perceived enjoyment might be related to the learning context in this study. Although portal or mobile services focus more on enjoyment, digital textbooks in the current study paid more attention to the function of learning as instructional media, which implied that learners perceive digital textbooks less enjoyable than other technologies for entertainment. However, perceived enjoyment indirectly affected continuance intention to use digital textbooks by mediating satisfaction. Still, digital textbooks need to employ instructional strategies to internally motivate learners and to make them engage in digital textbooks. With technological development, digital textbooks were introduced as a new learning media by combining diverse multimedia components with the formats of existing textbooks. The significance of this study is that it identified factors affecting continuance intention to use digital textbooks for learners and newer generations who have experienced rapid changes in learning environments. Based on the expectation-confirmation model, this study suggested strategies to increase continuance intention to use digital textbooks by verifying the causal relationships between related factors.
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* Related Article
Students' expectation, satisfaction, and continuance intention to use digital textbooks, Computers in Human Behavior, 69 April 2017, 83-90

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* References
Bhattacherjee, A. (2001). Understanding information systems continuance: An expectation-confirmation model. MIS Quarterly, 25(3), 351-370.

Jung, C. H., & Jung, Y. S. (2012). Determinants of the user's satisfaction and continued usage intention in IPTV services. The Society of Digital Policy & Management, 10(4), 137-146

Kim, B. (2010). An empirical investigation of mobile data service continuance: Incorporating the theory of planned behavior into the expectation confirmation model. Expert Systems with Applications, 37(10), 7033-7039.

Lin, C. S., Wu, S., & Tsai, R. J. (2005). Integrating perceived playfulness into expectation-confirmation model for web portal context. Information & Management, 42(5), 683e693.

Shiau, W. L., & Luo, M. M. (2013). Continuance intention of blog users: The impact of perceived enjoyment, habit, user involvement and blogging time. Behaviour & Information Technology, 32(6), 570-583.

Sørebø, Ø., Halvari, H., Gulli, V. F., & Kristiansen, R. (2009). The role of selfdetermination theory in explaining teachers' motivation to continue to use elearning technology. Computers & Education, 53(4), 1177-1187.

Thong, J. Y., Hong, S. J., & Tam, K. Y. (2006). The effects of post-adoption beliefs on the expectation-confirmation model for information technology continuance. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 64(9), 799-810.