The Mediating Role of Medical Students’ Attitudes towards Distance Education in the Relationship between E-Learning Styles and Academic Achievements

Melih Dikmen

doi:10.5296/jei.v6i2.17789

Abstract

The COVID-19 global outbreak is a growing concern for continuing medical education. The COVID-19 pandemic has led many medical education programs to be carried out online in the world. This research aims to examine the mediating effect of attitudes towards distance education in explaining the relationship between e-learning styles and academic achievements of students in medical education conducted online. The research was carried out on 148 students studying in a six-year medical program at a university. In the research, students completed the e-learning styles scale, attitude scale towards distance education, and online questionnaire include some demographic information via Moodle-based Learning Management System (LMS). In addition, end of year grade point averages of the students was also used within the scope of the research. In the research, the direct effect of e-learning styles on the grade point average and an indirect effect on attitude towards distance education were tested with the mediation model. It was determined that gender is not a significant variable on e-learning styles and attitudes towards distance education. It was observed that students with higher daily internet usage times had higher attitudes towards distance education. In the research, it was observed that the attitude towards distance education has a mediating effect on the relationship between e-learning style and academic success. It is important to consider e-learning styles and attitudes towards distance education to increase academic success in online medical courses and provide better learning outcomes.

Highlights

It is known that the global epidemic of COVID-19 negatively affects many sectors
When the most preferred e-learning styles of medical students are examined, it was determined in the order, logical learning (n = 48), independent learning (n = 42), audio-visual learning (n = 30), social learning (n = 15), active learning (n = 6), intuitive learning (n = 6) and verbal Learning (n = 1) (Table 1)
E-learning style Audio-visual Learning Verbal Learning Active Learning Social-Learning Independent Learning Logical Learning Intuitive Learning Total. Another situation examined in the research was the distribution of e-learning styles of medical students according to their gender and whether their e-learning styles differed statistically significantly or not

Summary

Introduction

It is known that the global epidemic of COVID-19 negatively affects many sectors These unprecedented adverse effects have interrupted the health system of many countries around the world (Hall et al, 2020). Due to the global epidemic, we are in the need to train future doctors have never been this much focus (Rose, 2020) In previous pandemics, such as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), there was a temporary interruption in education and training services. In the final stages of the teaching process, they have experience by participating in activities such as advanced clinical rotations and academic projects (Rose, 2020) In this regard, it can be said that the teaching activities to be conducted for medical faculties differ from other programs

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