Paramedic education: ABCD but do paramedic students want the ‘e’?

This cross sectional survey aimed to investigate undergraduate paramedic students’ attitudes to e-learning in five higher education institutions (HEI) in Australasia.

A paper-based questionnaire consisting of demographic questions plus the computer attitude survey (CAS); the online learning environment survey (OLES); and the attitude towards computer assisted instruction semantic differential scale (ATCAISDS) was distributed to convenience samples of students from each of the five HEIs during the first semester of 2009.

The CAS is designed to assess participants’ attitudes towards computers; the OLES assesses participants’ actual and preferred experience of a recently completed online learning module; and the ATCAISDS requires participants to identify which words most reflect their feelings about the use of computers. Participants were provided with 14 pairs of differential descriptive terms and were asked to rate each pair on a scale of 1 to 7 e.g. stimulating (score of 1) through to boring (score of 7).

A total of 339 students participated in the study. Just over half were female (57.7%), with the majority aged under 24 years (76.1%). The CAS has 2 subscales: the CASg focuses on attitudes towards computers in general, and the CASe towards computers in education. Responses to both subscales indicated overall attitudes in the middle of the scale (CASg mean=49.2, SD=4.9; and CASe mean=31.0, SD=5.2). Statistically significant differences in attitudes to computers in general and computers in education between participants from the different universities were found (P<0.0001).