Date of Award

January 2016

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Teaching & Learning

First Advisor

Kathy Smart

Abstract

Current technologies, specifically asynchronous video, allow instructors to enhance their online instructor social presence (OISP) by creating digital content in which they can simultaneously convey their unique persona verbally and nonverbally while supplementing course content. A strong OISP has been shown to contribute toward students’ successful course completion, which continues to be an issue at community colleges. Existing research on the use of digital content to enhance OISP, however, has primarily focused on students’ perceptions even though faculty members are responsible for establishing OISP. The purpose of this study was to ascertain community college faculty members’ perceptions of creating asynchronous videos (i.e., digital content) to enhance OISP; specifically, OISP enhancements related to verbal and nonverbal immediacy behaviors, successful course completion, and recognition from their institution for the effort required to create digital content.

A sampling frame of faculty members who teach online courses at five Midwestern U. S. community colleges were invited to participate in this quantitative study by completing the web-based survey. Responses from 91 faculty members were ultimately used to conduct the main analyses to determine if faculty members with different demographic characteristics, digital content creation, or self-reported student course completion rates differ significantly in terms of their perceptions.

The results indicated 45.6% of faculty members create digital content, while 27.8% of them do not but would like to. No significant differences were found between faculty members who do, do not, or would like to create digital content. However, there were several noticeable differences between their response mean levels for intentionally demonstrated verbal/nonverbal immediacy behaviors, digital content use as a contributing factor toward student’s successful course completion, and institutional recognition for effort required to create digital content. Additionally, strong positive correlations were found between verbal immediacy behaviors, nonverbal immediacy behaviors, and digital content use impacting successful course completion. Study results offer preliminary insight to community college faculty members and administrators about the percent and demographics of community college faculty members who are using asynchronous video to create digital content, how frequently faculty members are audible or visible in their digital content, and their perceptions of digital content creation.

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