Book2U and students’ learning styles: the effect of learning styles on intention to use a social media-enabled tool

Abstract

This study investigated the effects of students' learning styles on intention to use a social media-enabled tool, entitled Book2U. The focus was on three learning styles, that is, collaborative, independent and participative. Book2U was developed using the Push---Pull---Mooring theory, whilst the questionnaire used for data collection was based on five factors: Academic Reasons, Social Networking, Convenience, Self-efficacy and Ease of Use. Multi-group path modelling was administered on each group of learning styles. Social Networking, Self-efficacy and Convenience were found to have significant direct effects on intention to use Book2U for learning, regardless of the learning styles. No significant differences were observed for Convenience between the groups; however, independent learners emphasized more on Social Networking and Self-efficacy than the rest of the groups. Academic Reasons were found to be significant only among the independent learners, whilst Ease of Use had insignificant impact on intention to use Book2U across all the groups. The findings show that varying learning styles have differing effects in using Book2U for learning, suggesting the need for tools or platforms that cater to diverse groups of students. Understanding the different driving factors of such tools for students with different learning styles will also be beneficial for educators to effectively use any social media tools to assist students in their academic endeavours.