An analysis of the determinants of students' performance in e-learning

Previous studies show empirical evidence on the positive effect on students' performance from the adoption of innovations in the technology of teaching and learning. These innovations do not affect all teaching methods and learning styles equally. Rather, it depends on some variables, such as the strategy of a university towards adoption of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), students' abilities, technology uses in the educational process by teachers and students, or the selection of a methodology that matches with digital uses. This paper provides answers to these questions with data from an experimental set-up performed within the eLene-EE project, and using an empirical model based on structural equations. Our results show that motivation is the main variable affecting performance of online students, confirming the importance of this factor as a source of educational efficiency. Motivation appears in our model as a latent variable receiving the influence of students' perception of efficiency, which is, in turn, a driver for the indirect positive and significant effect on students' performance from students' ability in ICT uses. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.