The role of ICT self-efficacy for students' ICT use and their achievement in a computer and information literacy test

The increasing relevance of information and communication technologies (ICT) and society’s transition towards an information or knowledge society have led to the emergence of new challenges for schools and school systems. Thus, the need for students to develop new forms of skills like digital literacy or computer and information literacy (CIL) is constantly gaining in importance. In the IEA’s (International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement) ICILS 2013 (International Computer and Information Literacy Study), the aforementioned competencies were investigated—along with CIL learning contexts and outcomes (such as school-level factors in different education systems)—for the first time for secondary schools by applying computer-based student tests. The research presented in this paper focuses on the school-level factors that support or hinder the use of ICT by teaching staff and students’ CIL, drawing in the process on information obtained through school and teacher questionnaires. A multilevel approach was chosen for this research, drawing on representative data from four of the countries which participated in ICILS 2013, namely Australia, Germany, Norway and the Czech Republic. The results show that the relevance of school-level determinants for the use of ICT by teaching staff in schools differs between education systems. Only in Germany, for example, does pedagogical IT support seem to be crucial for the use of ICT in teaching. In the Czech Republic, the self-efficacy of teaching staff plays a key role, whereas in Australia, the participation of teaching staff in professional development activities can be identified as relevant for students’ acquisition of CIL. The results also show a statistically significant correlation between the teachers’ use of ICT in schools and students’ CIL for Germany, yet indicate no significant effects for Australia, Norway and the Czech Republic. In addition to these and the more specific findings for the considered countries, the international comparison presented in this paper reveals both strengths and developmental potential for the selected education systems.

Nowadays, more and more authors are convinced that ICT (information and communication technology) in early childhood education provides multiple possibilities for young children. The current study, conducted in Flanders, aims to get a clearer picture of ICT use in Flemish preschools. For this purpose, a questionnaire was composed consisting of newly developed and existing scales. Based on the answers of 232 preschool teachers, two types of ICT use are distinguished in early childhood education, ‘ICT use supporting basic ICT skills and attitudes’, and ‘ICT use supporting contents and individual learning needs’. ‘ICT use supporting basic ICT skills and attitudes’ occurs more frequently and is related to the grade of the preschoolers, teachers’ self-perceived ICT competences and the number of years of experience with ICT at school. ‘ICT use supporting contents and individual learning needs’ is strongly related to the grade of the preschoolers, teachers’ self-perceived ICT competences, ICT professional development and teachers’ attitudes towards the possibilities of ICT for teachers in early childhood education. This indicates that professional development is a crucial factor in stimulating ICT use that transcends teaching basic ICT skills and attitudes.

The problem motivating this research is the rapid introduction of educational technologies and the strong push to use new technologies in technical and vocational training in China coupled with varied responses and uneven adoption of new tools on the part of practitioners. This study investigated the factors that influence technical and vocational college teachers' adoption and appreciation of information and communication technology (ICT) in China using the technology adoption and gratification (TAG) model. At total of 535 teachers from public technical and vocational colleges were surveyed using a purposive sampling procedure. The survey data were analyzed through structural equation modeling. Findings suggest that the use of ICT had three primary determinants: teaching purpose, research purpose and academic purpose. Technical and vocational college teachers' technology adoption and gratification was directly and indirectly predicted by their computer self‐efficacy, intention to use, perceived ease of use and usefulness of ICT. Most importantly, the TAG model accounted for 77% of the variance in teachers' gratification using those predictive variables. This research successfully applied the TAG model and it further fosters recommendations for future investigations. This study contributes to theoretical, methodical and practical understandings of the use of ICT in technical and vocational education, which has been much less explored than in K‐12 education and university settings. Practitioner Notes What is already known about this topic Information and Communication Technology (ICT) helps explain teacher acceptance. Investigations have revealed that many gaps exist in identifying ICT facilities, access, skills and usage in technical and vocational education. Studies have suggested that ICT development requires significant training on the part of teachers and creates new demands for students. What this article adds This research exhibited that vocational and technical college teachers’ use of ICT had three primary determinants: teaching purpose, research purpose and academic purpose. Chinese technical and vocational college teachers’ adoption and gratification in new technologies were directly and indirectly predicted by their computer self‐efficacy, intention to use, perceived ease of use and usefulness of ICT. The findings of this study recommend that the quality of teaching, learning and research in vocational and technical education could be enhanced through the application of emerging ICT. Implications for practice and/or policy The larger goal is to use the results as a basis for future studies in the relatively unexplored area of ICT use and adoption in teaching and training in developing countries. By conducting cross‐cultural studies, researchers could be able to comprehend the overall scenarios of ICT in vocational and technical education as proposed. This study contributes to theoretical, methodical and practical understandings of the use of ICT in technical and vocational education, which has been much less explored than in K‐12 education and university settings. Teachers' skills to use ICT should be enhanced through ongoing training programs offered by the authorities of technical education.

Information and communication technology (ICT) can play a prominent role in human development due to its significant health impact on elderly adults. Unlike previous research, which treats ICT use as a general concept, this study investigates two dimensions of ICT use (active and passive use), and it draws upon self-determination theory to explain the effects of ICT use on life satisfaction as well as health. Additionally, we explore the moderating effects of perceived isolation and ICT self-efficacy, on the relationship between ICT use and life satisfaction. We conducted a survey with 297 valid samples from elderly individuals in China to test our hypotheses. The results show that active ICT use can affect both life satisfaction and health status. We also found that, ICT self-efficacycan moderate the relationship between active/passive ICT use and life satisfaction. However, perceived isolation only moderates the relationship between passive ICT use and life satisfaction.

ICT-related behavioral factors mediate the relationship between adolescents’ ICT interest and their ICT self-efficacy: Evidence from 30 countries

Principals have an important role to play in the implementation of digitalization in schools. They can be seen as role models for teachers with regard to information and communication technology (ICT) usage. Furthermore, there is nowadays a solid research linking educational leadership and management indirectly to student achievement. However, there is a lack of studies on the specific ICT usage of principals and the relationship with students' ICT skills. Against this background, our research aimed to find out whether different clusters of principals in Chile, Denmark, Germany, the Republic of Korea, and the United States can be identified on the basis of their leadership and management activities using ICT and whether there are differences in the distribution of the identified clusters across the countries. A latent class analysis was conducted using the International Computer and Information Literacy Study (ICILS) 2018 school questionnaire data. Across the five countries, three different clusters were identified based on principals’ activities using ICT. Proportions of principals’ distribution across the clusters varied significantly between the countries. In addition, it was investigated whether the clusters are related to students' computer and information literacy (CIL) using the means of student's scores in the computer based CIL test. No significant relation was found either when the five countries were considered together or individually.

The information and communication technology (ICT) enabling infrastructure, requisite skills, and subsequent usage in the country could facilitate ease of doing business (EDB) and support the heterogeneous distribution of resources for new businesses to flourish and remain competitive. However, from a policy perspective, the pathways through which ICT impacts entrepreneurial activities in a country are not clearly understood. In this study, we empirically investigate the direct and indirect (via EDB) effect of ICT infrastructure, skills, and use (at business, government, and individual level) in influencing entrepreneurial activity in a country. The results show that the citizens' ICT skills and ICT use, directly and indirectly, impact entrepreneurial initiatives in a country. In contrast, ICT infrastructure and use by the government only have an indirect impact on them. The study's findings should help guide national initiatives for promoting the creation of new businesses in a country.

The information and communication technology (ICT) enabling infrastructure, requisite skills, and subsequent usage in the country could facilitate ease of doing business (EDB) and support the heterogeneous distribution of resources for new businesses to flourish and remain competitive. However, from a policy perspective, the pathways through which ICT impacts entrepreneurial activities in a country are not clearly understood. In this study, we empirically investigate the direct and indirect (via EDB) effect of ICT infrastructure, skills, and use (at business, government, and individual level) in influencing entrepreneurial activity in a country. The results show that the citizens' ICT skills and ICT use, directly and indirectly, impact entrepreneurial initiatives in a country. In contrast, ICT infrastructure and use by the government only have an indirect impact on them. The study's findings should help guide national initiatives for promoting the creation of new businesses in a country.

Objectives In this study, affective factors such as self-efficacy, perception, and career expectations for Information and Communication Technology (ICT), which were surveyed in the ‘International Computer and Information Literacy Study (ICILS) 2018’, were analyzed. In particular, we focused on the effects of student characteristics such as Computer and Information Literacy(CIL) level, gender, and computer/software learning experience. Furthermore, these data were used to identify the ICT-related characteristics of middle school students in South Korea by identifying the similarities and differences with other participating countries through international comparison. Methods A total of 2,875 students (1,497 male (52.1%) and 1,378 female (47.9%)) enrolled in the second year of 150 middle schools nationwide participated in the computer-based assessment. Computer and Information Literacy was measured through self-report data. The information of educational use of ICT and student characteristics (gender, age), and student attitudes and perceptions were collected and analyzed. Results The percentage of students who responded that they were able to perform well on ICT-based learning tasks was lower than the ICILS 2018 average. In particular, ‘database creation’ showed the lowest rate. Also, students' self-efficacy for general and specialized applications was lower than the ICILS 2018 average. The perceptions of the positive and negative effects of ICT on society were higher than other participating countries. In terms of expectations for ICT-related careers, male students showed higher expectations than female students, indicating a gender difference. Conclusions Implications for effective approaches for nurturing future digital talents that can maximize the effect of education by improving the quality of computer and information education and reducing the gap between learners were proposed.

Aim and background This study investigated the effects of information and communication technology (ICT) use patterns, moderated by socioeconomic status (SES), on science and mathematics achievements. This investigation aims to address the issue of whether ICT use has ‘conditioned’ (linear and quadratic) effects on achievements with SES as social conditions, based on a posited Conditioned Ecological Techno-process (CET) model. Method Data from the 2012 Program for International Student Assessment for Taiwan were analyzed using regression analysis focusing on the effect of three ICT use patterns (leisure, educational, and school). Results The results support the CET model in the quadratic effects of all the three ICT use patterns on both achievements in addition to the positive linear effects of educational ICT use and the negative linear effects of leisure and school ICT use patterns. The moderation effect of SES only occurs with leisure ICT use on science achievement. Discussion The findings suggest that moderate frequent ICT use predicts the highest achievements. SES may aggravate the negative effect of leisure ICT use on science achievement.

Does ICT use matter? The relationships between students' ICT use, motivation, and science achievement in East Asia

Given the pivotal role of parents in their children's educational development, numerous studies have examined the impacts of parents' information and communications technology (ICT) proficiency on adolescents' information literacy. However, previous research has tended to treat parents as a holistic unit, ignoring the individual uniqueness of each parent in analyses. Thus, the first aim of this study was to explore the parent profiles in terms of ICT proficiency, which were developed through a person‐centered approach employing latent profile analysis. Three distinct parent profiles were identified: quiescent users, compliant users and active users. The second aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between the parents' profile memberships and adolescents' information literacy. The results showed that, in general, adolescents whose parents were identified as active users and compliant users tended to perform better on an information literacy test than those of parents categorized as quiescent users. More specifically, those adolescents whose parents were classified as active users achieved significantly higher scores in the information literacy test than those of parents who fit within the profiles of compliant users and quiescent users. Based on the findings, this paper discusses several implications and strategies for enhancing the adolescents' information literacy. Practitioner NotesWhat is already known about this topic Information literacy is a critical competence for adolescents, and the cultivation of adolescents' information literacy is a complex process which requires the joint effort of schools, communities and families. Parents are highly involved in adolescents' education, and parental involvement significantly influences their behaviors, attitudes, aspirations and motivations. Many studies have demonstrated that parents' ICT proficiency, such as their ICT self‐efficacy and ICT attitudes, does affect the adolescents' information literacy. What this paper adds Most studies in this subject‐area treat parents as a holistic unit without considering the differences in each parent's ICT proficiency. This paper contributes towards a more complex understanding of the differences in parental influences on the adolescents' information literacy. This paper identifies three distinct profiles categorizing parents' ICT proficiency: compliant users, quiescent users and active users. Adolescents whose parents were identified as active users and compliant users tended to perform better on an information literacy test than those of parents categorized as quiescent users. Adolescents whose parents can be considered active users achieved significantly higher scores in the information literacy test than those of parents who fit within the profiles of compliant users and quiescent users. Implications for practice and/or policy Several practical interventions can be implemented to address the deficiencies in parents' ICT proficiency. An initial action would be to arouse awareness among parents. For parents profiled as compliant users, social and public welfare organizations could organize public lectures to convey the importance of parents' ICT proficiency in the cultivation of their children's information literacy. In addition, schools could provide opportunities for regular parent‐school communication to help parents identify and understand the importance of their role in the cultivation of their children's information literacy. A second intervention would be to work towards improving the ICT proficiency of those parents categorized as quiescent users and compliant users. Governments need to forge partnerships with the local community organizations and schools to provide training for parents in basic ICT knowledge and skills, with the aim of enhancing parents' ICT self‐efficacy. Schools could conduct workshops, organize face‐to‐face information sharing sessions and provide online platforms for parents to discuss how best to mediate children's ICT use at home. Finally, in collaboration with schools, educators and researchers could develop homework projects to increase parental involvement in children's ICT use at home, which could simultaneously enrich parents' ICT usage experience and provide guidance for parents in terms of supporting their children's ICT learning at home.

In today’s digital age, the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in education is becoming increasingly important. The incorporation of ICT in education has the potential to change teaching and learning processes, increase access to education, and provide learners with skills needed to flourish in a digital world (UNICEF, 2020). However, for ICT to have a real impact on education, teachers must be trained in how to utilize ICT successfully as there has not been much capacity building programs to empower teachers in this area. Teacher capacitation is the process of preparing and assisting teachers to utilize ICT in education effectively and it is critical for the long-term integration of ICT in education (Jansen, 2023; Thulo,2024). To effectively integrate technology into their teaching and learning activities, teachers must have a variety of ICT abilities. These ICT abilities are divided into two categories: basic and advanced ICT skills. Basic ICT skills are essential for instructors to perform administrative chores, develop digital content, and access digital resources. Advanced ICT skills, on the other hand, are more complicated skills needed by instructors to create engaging and dynamic learning experiences (UNESCO, 2019). Teachers must be trained in curriculum integration, pedagogical practices, technical skills, and digital citizenship in order to accomplish long-term integration. The incorporation of ICT into education provides an opportunity to decolonize education in Africa by promoting fairness, peace, innovation, industrialization, and sustainability (Mazrui, 2003). Using a qualitative method and a case study approach incorporating semi-structured interviews, questionnaires, and classroom observations, this paper examined in depth the importance of ICT skills and teacher capacity for educational sustainability. A random sampling technique was adopted, with lecturers and students from the Midlands State University in Zimbabwe. The study included ten lecturers and twenty University students. Data was analysed using thematic analysis.

Background: The mechanisms through which information and communication technology (ICT) use influences chronic disease self-management remain unclear. Method: This cross-sectional investigation examined the mediating effects of health literacy, social support, and self-efficacy on the association between ICT use and self-management behaviors among older adults (≥60 years) with comorbidities in China (n = 520). The participants were recruited from a tertiary hospital in Shanghai (July 2023–June 2024), and data on sociodemographics, self-management, health literacy, social support, self-efficacy, and ICT use were collected via structured questionnaires. Results: Pearson’s correlation analysis revealed a significant association between ICT use, health literacy, social support, self-efficacy, and chronic disease self-management (p < 0.001). Multiple mediation modeling revealed a direct positive effect of ICT use on self-management (b = 1.3314, 95% CI = 0.6629, 2.0002). Furthermore, significant indirect effects were observed, mediated independently by both health literacy and social support. Additional serial mediation pathways included health literacy → social support, health literacy → self-efficacy, social support → self-efficacy, and a comprehensive pathway from health literacy through social support to self-efficacy. Conclusions: These findings collectively indicate that ICT use directly enhances chronic disease self-management among older adults with comorbidities. Moreover, ICT use indirectly improves self-management by enhancing health literacy, augmenting social support, and bolstering self-efficacy.

Students' profiles of ICT use: Identification, determinants, and relations to achievement in a computer and information literacy test