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The effect of using a home computer on students' educational use of IT
COMPUTERS & EDUCATION PERGAMON
Computers & Education 31 (1998) 211±227
The eect of using a home computer on students' educational use of IT Neil Selwyn * School of Education, University of Wales, 21 Senghennydd Road, Cardi CF2 4YG, U.K. Received 30 October 1997; accepted 18 March 1998
Abstract With many students' access to computers at home out-weighing their use of Information Technology (IT) in school, the importance of home computing has grown immensely over the last decade. This paper therefore seeks to examine the nature and extent of students' domestic use of computers and the subsequent relationship with their use of IT in schools and colleges. Using a sample of 16±19-year-old students, quantitative and qualitative data were gathered to explore students' experiences of home computing. The results suggest that students using computers at home have signi®cantly more positive attitudes toward using computers yet do not necessarily make more use of school or college-based IT; compensating for the inadequacies of educational IT with their use of computers at home. Nevertheless access to, and bene®ts gained from, home computers were found to dier signi®cantly according to students' gender. # 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction Despite the continued enthusiasm for Information Technology (IT) that has been shown by educationalists and policy-makers alike, it appears as if the computer has yet to make an eective impact in UK schools and colleges. As the recent Stevenson Report (Stevenson Committee, 1997) concluded: ``The state of information and communication technology in our schools is primitive and not improving. Much of the hardware is technologically behind the times . . . Penetration across schools is also extremely variable. . .very little software is directly related to the curriculum and the way ICT is used varies considerably'' (Section 1.1) * E-mail: selwynnc@cardi.ac.uk 0360-1315/98/$19.00 # 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S 0 3 6 0 - 1 3 1 5 ( 9 8 ) 0 0 0 3 3 - 5
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Yet whilst a fair proportion of information technology's apparent educational failure can be apportioned to the educational institutions themselves, students' use of computers (perhaps as much as any other curricular activity) is also greatly in¯uenced by their outside-school experiences and environment Shoner (1990). Indeed, the educational importance of students' domestic computing environment has long been recognised. Seymour Papert (1980) saw the regular availability of home computers as an integral part of children's learning. This argument has since been expanded by other authors to a point where students' use of home computers facilitates ``the exciting possibility of some kind of computer-inspired socio-literacy revolution'' (Moore, 1993; p. 26). There is now evidence that such predictions may well be belatedly coming to fruition. The last 5 yr has seen a huge boom in the home personal computer market. This is in some part due to the recent boom in sales to parents buying personal computers for their children, with the government estimating that between 40 and 50% of UK households will have at least one home computer within the next 2 yr (Timmins, 1997). Indeed, it can now be argued that many students are more likely to come into contact with IT at home than they are at school. Nevertheless, the exact nature and eect of home-based technology on students' subsequent school-based behaviour remains ambiguous. This paper therefore sets out to explore the exact nature of students' home computer use and its in¯uence on their subsequent use of, and attitudes towards, using IT in schools and colleges in the UK.
2. Previous research into students' use of home computers A number of earlier researchers have commented on students' use of home computers and the subsequent relationship with their use of school-based IT. For example, Kirkman (1993) found that over 90% of the average 12-year-old pupil's computer experience was gained at home. Furthermore, research has shown that students' domestic use of computers is distinctly dierent from their use in school. As can be expected, games-playing has been consistently found to be the most popular use to which home computers are put (Fife-Schaw, Breakwell, Lee & Spencer, 1986; Mohamedali, Messer & Fletcher, 1987; Kirkman, 1993). However, there is also evidence that an increasing proportion of students also use home computers for nongame playing activity such as word-processing, databases, spreadsheets, programming and new communications technologies such as the internet and electronic mail (Mohamedali et al., 1987). As Fontana (1988) argues, the relationship between home and school learning is not simple; with knowledge acquired outside school not necessarily used to support students' learning inside school. Therefore, when assessing the relationship between computer access at home and IT experiences at school it is important to be aware that any degree of transfer between the two may be limited (Underwood, Billingham & Underwood, 1994). Nevertheless, what little research there has been suggests that any use of a computer at home increases successful performance in school. For example, Underwood et al. (1994) found that out-of-school experience with computers correlated positively with classroom IT performance, both in terms of computer pro®ciency and amount of use in school.
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Other research has concentrated on the eect of students' IT experience gained at home and their overall attitudes towards computers. Although some studies claim strong relationships between home computer use and attitudes toward IT in the classroom, others ®nd no correlation at all. Colley, Gale and Harris (1994) found that greater use of computers at home led to lower computer anxiety for all students, as well as increasing con®dence for male students and greater liking of computers for females. Research by both Nelson (1988) and Kirkman (1993) also found similar correlations for primary and secondary students, with Kirkman (1993) asserting that home computer use has a stronger in¯uence on attitude than gender, socio-economic status or academic ability. As Selwyn (1997a; p. 81) concluded, ``it would seem that using a computer at home still gives students an advantage, if not in actual level of school IT use, then certainly in their attitudes towards using computers''. However, there is a similar body of research which contradicts these ®ndings. Underwood et al. (1994), despite reporting a relationship between home and school use, found that out-of-school experience did not predict attitudes towards computers in the classroom. This assertion was also reinforced by both Shashaani (1994) and Martin (1991); p. 193), the latter concluding that he found ``contrary to expectations, no relationship between attitudes and who owned a computer''. One recurring factor in research into students' use of home computers is that of gender. As Culley (1993) reported, male students are over twice as likely to have access to a home PC, with parents often more willing to buy a home computer for a son than they are for a daughter (Newton & Beck, 1993). There is evidence that gender dierences are an international trend, as Janssen Reinen and Plomp (1997; p. 71) concluded from their 10-nation survey, ``in terms of availability of computers at home, it is clear that male students have more possibilities to work with computers than females do''. Male students have consistently been found to use home computers more frequently and for more applications (Martin, 1991; Levine & Donitsaschmidt, 1995; Durndell & Thomson, 1997; Coomber, Colley, Hargreaves & Dorn, 1997) with boys' level of use of home IT remaining fairly constant with age whilst girls' use steadily declines as they get older (Coomber et al., 1997). However, there is also evidence that the nature of home IT use diers between the sexes, with boys preferring games-playing and programming whereas girls tend to opt for word-processing and educational software (Mohamedali et al., 1987; Martin, 1991; Kirkman, 1993; Griths & Hunt, 1995). Nevertheless, much of the previous body of literature concerning students' home use of computers is woefully dated. IT is a relentless and rapidly changing area of educational research and during the last decade alone the nature and extent of home computing has changed almost beyond recognition. The home PC market has mushroomed over the last 5 yr with the emergence of aordable multi-media machines with CD-Roms and access to the Internet and Electronic Mail. The marketing of home computers is now also ®rmly aimed at family and educational use rather than solely as games machines, re¯ecting the increasing capacity of aordable hardware as well as parents' growing awareness of the role IT is expected to play in their children's education. The vast majority of previous studies have also, as with much educational computing research (Selwyn, 1997b), been largely quantitative in nature. Whilst a quantitative approach is invaluable in providing a broad, substantive basis for research there is also the need for a more qualitative perspective on the nature of students' use of home computers and the subsequent
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eect this has on their use of IT in school. Thus the present study takes a combined approach to exploring students' domestic use of computers; ®rst presenting the results of a survey of students' use of IT both in and outside school, with further analysis based on data gained from subsequent interviews with students.
3. Methodology 3.1. Participants The data which form the present study took two forms. Firstly, as part of a larger research project into use of IT in 16±19 education (i.e year levels 12±14), questionnaires were administered to 983 students in Years 12 and 13 attending ®ve school-based sixth forms, one sixth form college and three tertiary/further education colleges in the South Wales area. All the students were in full-time education following either Advanced level courses (n = 698) or vocational courses (n = 285) such as GNVQs and BTEC quali®cations, and were all aged between 16 and 19 (mean = 16.92 yr). Of the 983 students, 55.5% were male (n = 546) and 44.5% were female (n = 437). Secondly, again as part of the larger research project, focus group interviews were held with students in every school and three of the colleges. In total 19 group interviews were held with a total of 96 students who had previously completed the questionnaires. Of the students interviewed, 58.3% were male (n = 56) with the remaining 41.7% female (n = 40). Fifty of the interviewees were following A-level courses with 46 pursuing vocational quali®cations.
3.2. Method I: questionnaire and Attitude Scale All the students completed the questionnaires in class time under the supervision of their teachers, who were supplied with written instructions. The whole survey consisted of six sections, the following four of which form the basis of the present study. 1. Demographic Information. Details of students' gender, age, year of study and courses and quali®cations sought. 2. Use of Computers Outside of School or College. Once students had indicated whether they had access to a computer outside of school or college those that had then indicated how often, and for what purposes, they used it. Students were required to rate how frequently they used a computer outside of school on a Likert-type scale ranging from 0±5 (where 0 = ``Never'', 1 = ``Occasionally'', 2 = ``Monthly'', 3 = ``Weekly'', 4 = ``Every 2/3 Days'' and 5 = ``Daily'') across a range of eight applications (``Games/Entertainment'', ``WordProcessing'', ``Art/Drawing'', ``Database/Spreadsheet'', ``Programming'', ``Internet'', ``EMail'' and ``Other''Ðwhere the respondent could specify any other application they used). 3. Use of Computers in School or College. Students then had to indicate how often and for what purposes they used a computer in each of the courses they were taking. This again
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took the form of a ®ve point Likert-type frequency scale across a range of nine applications (``Word-Processing'', ``Database/Spreadsheet'', ``CD-Rom'', ``Computer Aided Design'', ``Programming'', ``Simulations'', ``Internet'', ``E-Mail'' and ``Other''). Students could repeat this for a maximum of four subject areas. 4. Attitudes Towards Using Computers. This ®nal section consisted of Selwyn's (1997c) Computer Attitude Scale for 16±19 Education (16±19 CAS). This scale consists of 21 Likert-type statements divided into four subscales: anxiety of using computers, perceived control when using a computer, perceived usefulness of using a computer and behavioural attitudes towards using computers. Respondents rate themselves on each item on a ®vepoint Likert scale ranging from ``Strongly Agree'' to ``Strongly Disagree''. Selwyn (1997c) reported reliability (alpha) coecients for the four subscales with a sample of 16±19 students of 0.93 (anxiety), 0.88 (control), 0.82 (usefulness), 0.79 (behavioural), and 0.90 (overall). 3.3. Method II: focus group interviews Focus group interviews were then carried out with groups of between 4 to 8 students who had previously ®lled out questionnaires. Focus group interviews have been regularly used in social science research (Morgan & Spanish, 1984) and are recognised as an eective method of collecting qualitative data in an educational setting (Wilson, 1997). Each group interview lasted around 45 min and took a semi-structured approach designed to further explore the areas covered by the questionnaire and other factors in¯uencing students' use of computers in school and college. Of particular interest here are the data relating to students' domestic use of IT.
4. Questionnaire results 4.1. Students' access to a computer outside of school and college Over two-thirds of the students surveyed reported having access to a computer at home (68.2%, n = 670). However, male students were found to be signi®cantly more likely to have access to a computer at home than their female peers (w2=9.0659, P < 0.005). Interestingly, even greater dierences in home access were apparent between A-level and Vocational students (w2=20.8381, P < 0.00001). Whereas 72.5% (n = 506) of A-level students reported having access to a computer outside of school or college, only 57.5% (n = 164) of vocational students reported having similar opportunity to use IT at home. 4.2. Students' use of computers at home As Fig. 1 shows, students with access to computers outside of school and college made relatively extensive use of them, with over half using a home computer on at least a weekly basis. Similarly, Fig. 2 gives a breakdown of how each application is utilised on a weekly basis.
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Fig. 1. Frequency of students' use of IT applications at home. Data are percentage of students with home access to a computer (n = 670).
4.3. Home-using students' use of computers in school and college As Table 1 shows, although ``home-using'' students did not dier signi®cantly from students with no home access in terms of their overall use of IT in school or college, signi®cant dierences did occur regarding speci®c applications. The dierences in use of programming and simulation packages in school can be attributed to the subject dierences between students with and without a home computer, with home-using students more likely to be also taking high-using subjects such as IT and Design and Technology which involve the use of these specialised applications. Nevertheless, the fact that home-IT using students make more use of the internet and e-mail whilst in school and college suggests that they are more actively seeking out these ``optional'' applications which they have experience of using at home. However, students with use of a computer at home were not choosing to use more ``mainstream'' applications such as word-processing and CD-Roms at signi®cantly higher levels than students who exclusively rely on school or college for their access to IT. 4.4. The eect of using a computer at home on students' attitudes towards computers Students using a computer at home were consistently found to have more favourable attitudes towards computers than their non home-using peers. As can be seen from Table 2, signi®cant dierences were found between the two groups' attitudes towards using computers on all four attitude constructs, suggesting that using a computer at home gives students a considerable advantage, if not in actual level of school IT use, then certainly in their disposition toward using computers.
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Fig. 2. Students' use of IT applications at home. Data are percentage of students with home access to a computer (n = 670) using each application.
4.5. The eect of gender on home IT use As well as being less likely in the ®rst instance to have access to a computer outside of school and college, female students who did have access to a home computer were found to use domestic IT signi®cantly less often than their male counterparts (Mann±Whitney z = ÿ 8.5013, P < 0.00005). This division is illustrated in Fig. 3 which shows that male students are more likely to be using a home computer on a very frequent (i.e. daily/2±3 days) basisÐwhereas females are more likely to only be using a home computer on an irregular (i.e. monthly/occasional basis). Furthermore, as Table 3 shows, this gender-dierentiated use of home computers is signi®cant across all applications, apart from the ``Miscellaneous'' category. Moreover, although male students have higher levels of use across all applications, the preferences of home-users also diers according to gender. When students' regular use of home computers is Table 1 Home and non-home using students' use of IT in school and college
Word-processing Database-spreadsheet CD-Rom C.A.D. Programming Simulations E-mail Internet Overall use
Home computer (n = 670)
No home computer (n = 670)
Mann±Whitney Z
Signi®cance
2.13 1.28 0.94 0.94 0.86 0.25 0.16 0.40 2.58
2.04 1.14 0.84 0.32 0.49 0.09 0.08 0.27 2.38
ÿ0.9521 ÿ1.5952 ÿ1.4965 ÿ0.7590 ÿ3.5460 ÿ4.3289 ÿ2.1943 ÿ2.9118 ÿ1.7853
n/s n/s n/s n/s P < 0.0005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.05 P < 0.005 n/s
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Table 2 Students' scores on the 16±19 computer Attitude Scale Attitude construct Anxiety Perceived control Perceived usefulness Behavioural Overall attitude
Home computer (n = 670) 18.1642 14.7433 14.4299 11.2761 58.8134
Non home-users (n = 313) 16.2939 12.6262 13.1118 10.2013 52.2332
t-score 6.11 7.04 6.25 5.04 7.60
Signi®cance P < 0.0005 P < 0.0005 P < 0.0005 P < 0.0005 P < 0.0005
N.B. A higher score denotes a more positive attitude towards computers.
analysed (i.e. use on at least a weekly basis) it transpires that more boys prefer to play games than use a word-processor, whereas this trend is reversed for female students. Similarly relatively more female students prefer using art packages and the internet, whereas relatively more boys use databases, spreadsheets and programming. Students with access to a home computer were found to have signi®cantly more positive attitudes towards IT, both in the case of male students (t = 6.63, P < 0.0005) and females (t = 3.15, P < 0.005); albeit at diering levels of signi®cance. Two-way analyses of variance (2 2 ANOVAs) were then carried out to discover whether the bene®ts of using a home computer on students' attitudes were signi®cantly gendered. Although for both sexes using a home computer corresponds with higher attitudes, female students' attitudes are less signi®cantly improved by using a home computer in terms of their anxiety, perceived control and overall attitude towards computers (see Table 4). Thus the eect of being a home computer user (at least in terms of anxiety, perceived control and overall attitude) is signi®cantly dependent on students' gender. It must be borne in mind that using a home
Fig. 3. Frequency of students' use of IT applications at home by gender. Data are percentages of students with home access to a computer (n = 670).
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Table 3 Frequency of students' use of IT at home by gender
Word-processing Games Art/drawing Databases/spreadsheets Programming Internet E-mail Misc. Overall use
Male students (n = 394) 2.93 3.17 1.45 1.60 1.13 0.78 0.55 0.27 11.89
Female (n = 276) 2.55 1.77 1.01 0.98 0.39 0.41 0.31 0.18 5.03
Mann±Whitney Z ÿ4.1256 ÿ10.9675 ÿ4.5153 ÿ6.0578 ÿ7.1167 ÿ4.6750 ÿ3.7272 ÿ0.6791 ÿ9.3419
Signi®cance P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.0005 n/s P < 0.00005
computer has a positive eect for both sexes, but that boys seem to be bene®ting at greater levels from using a home computer than girls. So far from improving inequalities in students' attitudes towards computers, home computer use appears to be, if anything, increasing gender dierences. 5. Interview results On the basis of these questionnaire data, the interview section of the study sought to further explore two main areas of students' use of domestic IT. Firstly, its link with their use of IT in school and college and secondly, the in¯uencing factors behind the apparent gendered use of home computers. 5.1. Educational computing: the home/school divide It soon became apparent that the vast majority of students who had computer-related work from school preferred to work on their home computers. Students oered various reasons for this, primarily because working from home oered more conducive conditions, both temporally and contextually, for working on a computer: Table 4 2 2 ANOVAs showing the interaction eects between home computer use and gender on students' attitudes toward using computers
Attitude construct Anxiety Behavioural Perceived control Perceived use Overall attitude
Male Non-user (n = 152) 17.23 10.62 13.82 13.45 55.13
User (n = 394) 19.15 11.90 16.22 14.95 62.49
Female Non-user (n = 161) 15.41 9.81 11.50 12.79 49.50
User (n = 276) 16.37 10.40 12.63 13.68 53.08
f 4.35 2.69 5.05 2.12 5.68
Signi®cance P < 0.05 n/s P < 0.05 n/s P < 0.05
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Lewis ``There's a better environment there. . . you can have a bit to eat, watch a bit of T.V., do a bit of work. Rather than sitting in college where you've got to keep quiet and go on. . . [mimes tap, tap, tap action]'' [Business Studies Student] Jackie: ``I've got a computer at home and I just ®nd it easier, apart from my mum moans about the electricity. Its just easier, you've got exactly the same as they've got here [in school] but you've got 24 hour access and you can do things when you want to'' [Humanities Student] Many students also indicated that they preferred working on a computer at home because they could do so in relative solitudeÐas opposed to school where using a computer inevitably involved ``distraction'' from either teachers or other students: Michelle: ``I never use a computer in school because I've got one at home. There's no distractions there and there's no time limit either. I mean if you're sitting on a computer at school and there's someone behind waiting to use it you like rush it, do you know what I mean?'' [Art Student] William: ``You can use your computer at home whenever you want, there's no-one bothering you. Here you've always got teachers hanging around saying `go on there's other people that want to use them, do this, do that'. At home you can do what you like'' [IT Student] Similarly, for less con®dent students, access to a home computer allowed them the opportunity to experiment and explore using a computer in private, thus gaining the initial con®dence to use IT. This, they felt, could not be achieved in school: Peter: ``You just build a general knowledge of computers at home. I mean if you sit at home and you mess it up or something goes wrong. . . I suppose there's no-one sitting beside you to laugh for starters, so you can explore. When you're in school you get given a sheet and you load it up and follow the instructions. `Type this type that'. Its a waste of time'' [Modern Languages Student] Indeed many of the students with home computers felt that the ``freedom'' of working at home allowed them to work more eectively and ultimately produce work to a higher standard than would be possible if they were con®ned to working on computers in school or college: Tim: ``It aects how good your work is too. We can come home have a rest for an hour and then start on the work whereas they have to get on with it straight after lectures. So you've been concentrating all day and then after that you've got to do all your assignments. It can't help'' [IT Student] Similarly, those students without access to a computer at home were constricted by their lack of access to domestic IT, arguing that their school work suered as a result: Ceri: ``It means that we can't do as much work as we'd like to because we haven't got a computer, [on the course] we need to do all our work on a computer so if you haven't got one at home you can't work at home . . . it puts us back a bit'' [Health and Social Care Student]
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Jess: ``Over the weekend doing my biology practical I spent so much time writing it up by hand and then I made mistakes and I had to go and do it again and I thought `I'm not going to be able to do this when I go to university' and I felt really disadvantaged at not having a wordprocessor. So yeah, I feel disadvantaged. I mean, I couldn't go anywhere because it was the weekend and I didn't have time to use a computer in college'' [Physics Student] Nevertheless, for less experienced students the advantage of domestic IT was restricted. The distinction between school and home IT was so great for some students that they felt that they couldn't transfer IT skills learnt at home to the school setting: Jenny: ``I'm all right at home but I'm not con®dent on the ones in school. I was in business studies and we had these disks and they were all together and we had to pick one and we didn't know what we were doing and then you had to load to up and then all of a sudden you'd wipe something o and you didn't know what you were doing on it basically. I've got a more modern one at home which explains things better'' [Modern Languages Student] As this last quote suggests, this is often caused by the huge gulf between the quality of the hardware to be found in most schools and the comparative ``hi-tech'' IT environment that many students are used to using at home. Thus many students see themselves as using computers at home to compensate for a lack of quality IT resources at school: Phil: ``I think that if I didn't have a computer at home I wouldn't know what the hell to do when I have to use a computer in school. They don't teach you the right things here. In business studies they still use the old Amstrad computers which are about 20 years oldÐyou just sit there and laugh. . . Most of the computers [in school] are 286s and those ones with the green screens from the Stone Age. . . They're like nothing we'd ever have to use again. If I got a job using computers on the strength of those lessons I wouldn't have a clue what I was doing, whereas from using one at home I'd be all right. Its all modernised and tells you what to do'' [Modern Languages Student] 5.2. Gender distinctions in students' experiences of home IT When talking to students about how they originally got involved with using computers at home the link between boys' experiences of computers when children and adolescents and the use of computer games was quickly apparent. Many male students cited playing computer games as the initial stimulus for them to start using IT at home: Q: ``How did you ®rst start using computers?'' James: ``Just messing around on computers at home. . . I remember playing when I was very young. . .with just a bat and a ball on the screen and went on from there'' [Business Studies Student] When asked why they had been attracted speci®cally attracted to computer games students often found it hard to verbalise this appeal. Some male students did however mention the competitive, and sometimes violent, nature of such programs:
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Steve: ``It probably does start from games when you were young and boys seem more wanting to beat each other and play each other and then eventually they play loads and then they want to know how the game works. So it like progresses and your interest gets bigger as you mature'' [Chemistry Student] Rhys: ``Yeah, boys are always playing on computers when they're young, ®ghting games. . .and it goes from there. Mindless violence . . .'' [IT Student] However, male students generally seemed in agreement that girls were not attracted to using computers at home through similar means: Chris: ``Males innit, when they're little they get into computer games and when they're older they go on to do dierent stu, drawing on a computer. . . they just get into it don't they, girls just don't think of using computers when they're younger'' [Humanities Student] Rhys: ``There's is only one girl on our course. Its the games. Most of them are aimed at boys and that's how most people get into computers, through games. Nobody buys a computer just for the business stu. . . not originally. We used them more when we were young. We had consoles and that's where all the games were and the girls like didn't want to know'' [IT Student] Interestingly, the female students concurred with this sentiment in the interview groups: Fiona: ``It shouldn't be a male thing but it probably is. Boys always grow up . . .when I was playing with dolls my brother was playing on Gameboy and things and so after you win the game you want to do something more and more and then you've got to get bigger and bigger systems and they've got more interest in the whole thing'' [English Literature Student] Indeed, whereas male students seemed to have been initially attracted to computers through games and then continued to use computers on a regular basisÐboth still gaming and for other activities, female students were less enthusiastic. Many seemed dismissive, and even disparaging, of the leisure and games software: Fiona: ``And the games are all rubbish now anyway aren't they? Because all the games my brother has are . . . I mean when I used to play on computers it was all like Space Invaders and stu, but now its all like really good graphics and going round rooms looking for stu! It's like, he's got this game, `Harvesters' or something, and you just go round and round. Its just so boring, so what's the point of going round? Its like, you know, a maze game and they're all stupidÐthey've all got certi®cates on them, like 18. The only games that I like are like formula one games'' [English Literature Student] Katie: ``I prefer the games on the Nintendo because they're more skilful aren't theyÐwhen you have to walk round the walls and stu its just boring isn't it? Rubbish'' [French Student] There was also evidence that, when girls did use IT at home, this was only due to necessity rather than an on-going attraction. Indeed, some female students confessed to never touching a computer now for their studies although they had regularly done so in the past when requirement to do so was mandatory for the courses they were following:
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Andy: ``For GCSEs I used the computer at home all the time, everything I wrote for GCSEs would be rewritten at home on the computer but now. . . by the time I've written them up on paper ready to type them into a computer. By the time you've got onto the computer there's always something else that'll take me away from the computer, in the background, or your eyes start hurting. I just ®nd that I won't get it ®nished if I do it on the computer or it'll end up coming in late. It easier to write it up on paper'' [Humanities Student] Karen: ``It was an advantage when I was doing GCSEs because it saved me staying behind after school or in lunchtimesÐI could just go home and use the computer there. . . but now for A-levels I don't use it hardly ever'' [History Student] Helen: ``I think I don't use mine because I manage to get most of what I want to in college and so when I get home I think `oh I don't want to go on a computer again' unless I've really got something to hand in'' [Geography Student] This would seem to echo Shiann and Macleod's (Shiann & Macloed, 1986) contention that whereas boys are far more likely to be intrinsically interested in the computer, female students make far more pragmatic (and therefore sporadic) use of IT; only using a computer for a speci®c purpose and not for its own sake. Indeed, for many of the higher using male students using a computer at home still appeared to be a leisure activityÐappealing to male students both mentally: Keith: ``I like the logical elementÐthe whole packageÐI'm mad for it'' [Physics Student] Steve: ``Once you get your mind round it its just getting your mind round something working on a computer'' [IT Student] Chris: ``Its quite rewarding as well, if you get a program to work then its something. If you just written an essay then its like . . . great'' [IT Student] . . . and socially: Leigh ``Its just something to do isn't it? You can go round a mate's house and spend the whole evening playing on the computer. You have a laugh but you're also having to think and react all the time. Its a good waste of time really'' [Business Studies Student] However, many of the female students interviewed described using a computer at home as an anti-social activity which they were keen to disassociate themselves from: Fiona: [referring to another member of the interview group who had just been talking about playing games on his home computer] ``But he's boringÐhe's like `oh I don't do nightclubs, I don't go out' and stays there with his computer. All he does is work out and play on his computer. I don't want to be like that! That's probably why I don't like them actually because they're unsociable. I don't want to spend hours on my own playing on a computer'' [English Literature Student] Indeed, when justifying why they did not spend any of their leisure time using computers, female students were quick to portray themselves as more sociable and socially active than their male, computer-using peers:
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Alison: ``I think we're more interested in what's happening in the world than what boys are'' [Modern Languages Student] Nicola: ``Girls are more after boys, and boys are more after computers aren't they'' [Modern Languages Student] Ceri: ``Yeah, but then the boys who use the games have got nothing better to do'' [Leisure and Tourism Student] Charlotte: ``Yeah, cause we go out more often when the boys just stay in front of a computer playing games. . .we go out socialising'' [Art Student] However, this assessment was ironically more sympathetic when discussing a female peer who had temporally succumbed to using a home computer: Nicola: ``It depends doesn't it? It sucks you in. I mean Charlotte, when she ®rst got her Internet she wouldn't stop. She wouldn't go out until about nine o'clock. You'd get home from school and you'd try to phone her and she'd be engaged for about six hours. She wouldn't come out until she'd had her ®x'' [Modern Languages Student] Thus it seems that female students do not share the same enthusiasm for using computers outside of school and college as many of their male peers. For many girls at least who have not grown up with a culture of home IT use, a computer is a tool which can be used for some purposes in a school/compulsory context. Nevertheless, this utility does not seem to extend beyond school into girls' domestic and leisure time, within which female students are keen to distance themselves from computer use.
6. Discussion Twenty years since the emergence of the home computer market it is evident from this study how many more students now have access to domestic IT and how most are making regular and extensive use of it. This would seem to suggest that the home, rather than school or college, provides the primary IT experience for many students. In the light of the advantages that home computer use entails, increasing concern should therefore be shown for those students (a third of the overall sample) who are without access to domestic IT. As this paper has shown, the eect of home computer use on students' use of IT in school and college is not straight-forward; with home computer users only making signi®cantly more use of certain areas of educational IT (the internet and E-mail, and the more specialist applications such as programming and simulations). However, there was evidence from the interview data that the principal advantage that domestic IT users have is ready access to an often more sophisticated IT environment and, therefore, more access to the ``computer culture'' than would be possible from only using a computer in school. As Loveless (1996) argues, students' experiences of home computer use may not be entirely complemented by the nonvoluntary and educational nature of school IT use. ``The [computers'] most powerful learning toolsÐdatabases, spreadsheetsÐare also the least seductive to students, the least likely to utilise the dramatic graphics and sound eects adorning best selling computer games''
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(Loveless, 1996; p. 461). This re¯ects a common dichotomy of educational and home computer use. It may well be that, for some students at least, the educational IT environment lags so far behind their out-of-school computer use that they will not choose to use computers when in school or college. Therefore, home computer users have little reason to use school-based IT more, but the fact that they are making at least as much, if not more, use of computers in school and college than their non-home using peers, means that all their home-IT use is advantageous. In other words, students without access to a computer at home are not compensating for this by making extra use of school and college IT resources. Furthermore, the positive eect of access to a home computer on students' attitudes is irrefutable, with home users displaying signi®cantly more favourable attitudes towards computers across all domains. This is arguably more worrying for non-home using students as attitudes have been argued to be highly in¯uential in determining long-term computer-related behaviour (Selwyn, 1997d). Thus access to a home computer during a students' school career may be fostering advantages that will continue to be felt long after an individual has left school. The fact that home computer using students were found to have more favourable attitudes is hardly surprising given the established link between computer-related attitudes and positive IT experiences. From the interview data it is obvious that students are receiving far more positive experiences of IT from home than they are at school, which is only increasing the likelihood of them becoming lifelong IT users. The same cannot be said of the students who are solely relying on school or college for their computer use. It was disappointing however to discover that gender remains a divisive factor in students' use of home computers. As well as being less likely to have access to domestic IT, those female students that could use home computers were doing so both less often and for less applications, than their male counterparts. Furthermore, all the attitude-related advantages discussed previously were less pronounced for female home computer users than they were for males. So far from diminishing gender inequity, access to a home computer appears to be widening dierences (both in terms of use and attitude) between male and female students. There was also a noticeable reticence amongst female interviewees toward getting involved too heavily with IT or to be seen as a ``computer user''. So it may well be that general stereotyping of using computers is the key mediating factor in the apparent gendered eects of students' home computer use rather than domestic IT itself. Given the heightened importance of domestic IT use suggested by this study, there is clearly a need for future research investigating the characteristics of those students using computers at home but, more importantly, those students without access to home computers who are therefore put at a considerable disadvantage. Although this study has been successful in highlighting gender as a salient factor other areas demand equal attention. Schall and Skeele (1995) highlight potential impediments to home computer use as cost, software quality, gender bias and family background. There is therefore clearly a need to further explore the role of socioeconomic dierences in access to home computers (Milone & Salpeter, 1996). Social class has been found to be a factor in adult learners' access to home computers (Selwyn & Moss, 1997), but further research is required to assess its importance in an educational context. Equally, more longitudinal and comparative research is also needed to examine how students' home use of IT changes with age. If an early involvement with games does lead to more serious and prolonged involvement with computers in later life we need to understand
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more fully the relationship between home-computer activity and students' disposition and engagement with school-based technology as they progress through their educational career. In practical terms, schools and colleges should therefore strive to make IT experiences more positive so that females and non-home using students are not disadvantaged as they currently are and so that access to a home computer ceases to become as much of a bene®t. As the lower levels of female home IT use suggest, this may not be so much a case of increasing access to computer resources but encouraging students to want to use IT. Similarly, teachers should show awareness of those students without access to domestic computers and ensure that these students are not discriminated against, especially in terms of use of new information technologies such as the internet and E-mail. Over the last two decades, research has consistently shown that educational computing is a divisive factor in schools and colleges. As this paper has shown, the role of students' domestic use of IT cannot be overlooked or underestimated in this equation.
References Colley, A. M., Gale, M. T., & Harris, T. A. (1994). Eects of gender role identity and experience on computer attitude components. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 10(2), 129±137. Coomber, C., Colley, A., Hargreaves, D. J., & Dorn, L. (1997). The eects of age, gender and computer experience upon computer attitudes. Educational Research, 39(2), 123±133. Culley, L. (1993). Gender equity and computing in secondary schools: issues and strategies for teachers. In Computers into Classrooms: More Questions than Answers, (pp. 147±159). J. Beynon & H. Mackay (Eds), London: Falmer. Durndell, A., & Thomson, K. (1997). Gender and computing: a decade of change?. Computers and Education, 28(1), 1±10. Fife-Schaw, C., Breakwell, G. M., Lee, T., & Spencer, J. (1986). Patterns of teenage computer usage. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 2, 152±161. Fontana, D. (1988). Psychology for Teachers. Leicester: BPS. Griths, M. D., & Hunt, N. (1995). Computer game playing in adolescenceÐprevalence and demographic indicators. Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology, 5(3), 189±193. Janssen Reinen, I., & Plomp, T. (1997). Information Technology and gender equality: a contradiction in terminis. Computers and Education, 28(2), 65±78. Kirkman, C. (1993). Computer experience and attitudes of 12-year-old students: implications for the UK National Curriculum. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 9, 51±62. Levine, T., & Donitsaschmidt, S. (1995). Computer experience, gender and classroom environment in computer supported writing classes. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 13(4), 337±357. Loveless, T. (1996). Why aren't computers used more in schools?. Educational Policy, 10(4), 448±467. Martin, R. (1991). School children's attitudes towards computers as a function of gender, course subjects and availability of home computer. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 7, 187±194. Milone, M. N., & Salpeter, J. (1996). Technology and equity issues. Technology and Learning, 16(4), 38±41. Mohamedali, M. H., Messer, D. J., & Fletcher, B. (1987). Factors aecting microcomputer use and programming ability of secondary school children. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 3, 224±239. Moore, A. (1993). Siuli's maths lesson: autonomy or control? In Computers into Classrooms: More Questions than Answers' London, (pp. 26±38). J. Beynon & H. Mackay (Eds), Falmer. Morgan, D. L., & Spanish, M. T. (1984). Focus groups: a new tool for qualitative research. Qualitative Sociology, 7(3), 253±270. Nelson, L. (1988). attitudes of Western Australian students towards micro-computers. British Journal of Educational Technology, 19(1), 53±57. Newton, P., & Beck, E. (1993) ``Computing: an ideal occupation for women? In Computers into Classrooms: More Questions than Answers, (pp. 130±146). J. Beynon & H. Mackay (Eds), London: Falmer. Papert, S. (1980). Mindstorms: Children, Computers and Powerful Ideas. New York: Harvester Press. Schall, P. L., & Skeele, R. W. (1995). Creating a home±school partnership for learning: exploiting the home computer. Educational Forum, 59(3), 244±249. Selwyn, N. (1997a). The eect of using a computer at home on students' school use of I.T. Research in Education, 58, 79±81.
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Selwyn, N. (1997b). The continuing weakness of educational computing research. British Journal of Educational Technology, 28(4), 305± 307. Selwyn, N. (1997c). Students' attitudes toward computers: validation of a computer attitude scale for 16±19 education. Computers and Education, 28(1), 35±41. Selwyn, N. (1997d). Teaching IT to the `Computer-shy': a theoretical perspective on a practical problem. Journal of Vocational Education and Training, 49(3), 395±408. Selwyn, N., & Moss, G. D. (1997). I.T.'s not just a kid's revolution: an empirical study of adult computer learners. Research into Postcompulsory Education, 1(3), 277±292. Shashaani, L. (1994). Gender dierences in computer experience and its in¯uence on computer attitudes. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 11(4), 347±367. Shiann, G., & Macloed, H. (1986). Computers and children of primary school age: issues and questions. British Journal of Educational Technology, 17, 133±144. Shoner, L. B. (1990). The eects of home environment on achievement and attitudes toward computer literacy. Educational Research Quarterly, 14(1), 6±14. Stevenson Committee, 1997. Independent Commission into Information and Communications Technology in Secondary Schools 1996/ 1997 [available on the Internet: http://rubble.ultralab.anglia.ac.uk/stevenson/report.html]. Timmins, N. (1997). Schools' IT a National Priority Says Report. The Financial Times [CD-Rom], March 20, Story 557. Underwood, J., Billingham, M., & Underwood, G. (1994). Predicting computer literacy: how do the technological experiences of schoolchildren predict their computer based problem-solving skills?. Journal of Information Technology for Teacher Education, 3(1), 115± 125. Wilson, V. (1997). Focus groups: a useful qualitative method for educational research?. British Educational Research Journal, 23(2), 209± 224.
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The eect of using a home computer on students' educational use of IT Neil Selwyn * School of Education, University of Wales, 21 Senghennydd Road, Cardi CF2 4YG, U.K. Received 30 October 1997; accepted 18 March 1998
Abstract With many students' access to computers at home out-weighing their use of Information Technology (IT) in school, the importance of home computing has grown immensely over the last decade. This paper therefore seeks to examine the nature and extent of students' domestic use of computers and the subsequent relationship with their use of IT in schools and colleges. Using a sample of 16±19-year-old students, quantitative and qualitative data were gathered to explore students' experiences of home computing. The results suggest that students using computers at home have signi®cantly more positive attitudes toward using computers yet do not necessarily make more use of school or college-based IT; compensating for the inadequacies of educational IT with their use of computers at home. Nevertheless access to, and bene®ts gained from, home computers were found to dier signi®cantly according to students' gender. # 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction Despite the continued enthusiasm for Information Technology (IT) that has been shown by educationalists and policy-makers alike, it appears as if the computer has yet to make an eective impact in UK schools and colleges. As the recent Stevenson Report (Stevenson Committee, 1997) concluded: ``The state of information and communication technology in our schools is primitive and not improving. Much of the hardware is technologically behind the times . . . Penetration across schools is also extremely variable. . .very little software is directly related to the curriculum and the way ICT is used varies considerably'' (Section 1.1) * E-mail: selwynnc@cardi.ac.uk 0360-1315/98/$19.00 # 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S 0 3 6 0 - 1 3 1 5 ( 9 8 ) 0 0 0 3 3 - 5
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Yet whilst a fair proportion of information technology's apparent educational failure can be apportioned to the educational institutions themselves, students' use of computers (perhaps as much as any other curricular activity) is also greatly in¯uenced by their outside-school experiences and environment Shoner (1990). Indeed, the educational importance of students' domestic computing environment has long been recognised. Seymour Papert (1980) saw the regular availability of home computers as an integral part of children's learning. This argument has since been expanded by other authors to a point where students' use of home computers facilitates ``the exciting possibility of some kind of computer-inspired socio-literacy revolution'' (Moore, 1993; p. 26). There is now evidence that such predictions may well be belatedly coming to fruition. The last 5 yr has seen a huge boom in the home personal computer market. This is in some part due to the recent boom in sales to parents buying personal computers for their children, with the government estimating that between 40 and 50% of UK households will have at least one home computer within the next 2 yr (Timmins, 1997). Indeed, it can now be argued that many students are more likely to come into contact with IT at home than they are at school. Nevertheless, the exact nature and eect of home-based technology on students' subsequent school-based behaviour remains ambiguous. This paper therefore sets out to explore the exact nature of students' home computer use and its in¯uence on their subsequent use of, and attitudes towards, using IT in schools and colleges in the UK.
2. Previous research into students' use of home computers A number of earlier researchers have commented on students' use of home computers and the subsequent relationship with their use of school-based IT. For example, Kirkman (1993) found that over 90% of the average 12-year-old pupil's computer experience was gained at home. Furthermore, research has shown that students' domestic use of computers is distinctly dierent from their use in school. As can be expected, games-playing has been consistently found to be the most popular use to which home computers are put (Fife-Schaw, Breakwell, Lee & Spencer, 1986; Mohamedali, Messer & Fletcher, 1987; Kirkman, 1993). However, there is also evidence that an increasing proportion of students also use home computers for nongame playing activity such as word-processing, databases, spreadsheets, programming and new communications technologies such as the internet and electronic mail (Mohamedali et al., 1987). As Fontana (1988) argues, the relationship between home and school learning is not simple; with knowledge acquired outside school not necessarily used to support students' learning inside school. Therefore, when assessing the relationship between computer access at home and IT experiences at school it is important to be aware that any degree of transfer between the two may be limited (Underwood, Billingham & Underwood, 1994). Nevertheless, what little research there has been suggests that any use of a computer at home increases successful performance in school. For example, Underwood et al. (1994) found that out-of-school experience with computers correlated positively with classroom IT performance, both in terms of computer pro®ciency and amount of use in school.
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Other research has concentrated on the eect of students' IT experience gained at home and their overall attitudes towards computers. Although some studies claim strong relationships between home computer use and attitudes toward IT in the classroom, others ®nd no correlation at all. Colley, Gale and Harris (1994) found that greater use of computers at home led to lower computer anxiety for all students, as well as increasing con®dence for male students and greater liking of computers for females. Research by both Nelson (1988) and Kirkman (1993) also found similar correlations for primary and secondary students, with Kirkman (1993) asserting that home computer use has a stronger in¯uence on attitude than gender, socio-economic status or academic ability. As Selwyn (1997a; p. 81) concluded, ``it would seem that using a computer at home still gives students an advantage, if not in actual level of school IT use, then certainly in their attitudes towards using computers''. However, there is a similar body of research which contradicts these ®ndings. Underwood et al. (1994), despite reporting a relationship between home and school use, found that out-of-school experience did not predict attitudes towards computers in the classroom. This assertion was also reinforced by both Shashaani (1994) and Martin (1991); p. 193), the latter concluding that he found ``contrary to expectations, no relationship between attitudes and who owned a computer''. One recurring factor in research into students' use of home computers is that of gender. As Culley (1993) reported, male students are over twice as likely to have access to a home PC, with parents often more willing to buy a home computer for a son than they are for a daughter (Newton & Beck, 1993). There is evidence that gender dierences are an international trend, as Janssen Reinen and Plomp (1997; p. 71) concluded from their 10-nation survey, ``in terms of availability of computers at home, it is clear that male students have more possibilities to work with computers than females do''. Male students have consistently been found to use home computers more frequently and for more applications (Martin, 1991; Levine & Donitsaschmidt, 1995; Durndell & Thomson, 1997; Coomber, Colley, Hargreaves & Dorn, 1997) with boys' level of use of home IT remaining fairly constant with age whilst girls' use steadily declines as they get older (Coomber et al., 1997). However, there is also evidence that the nature of home IT use diers between the sexes, with boys preferring games-playing and programming whereas girls tend to opt for word-processing and educational software (Mohamedali et al., 1987; Martin, 1991; Kirkman, 1993; Griths & Hunt, 1995). Nevertheless, much of the previous body of literature concerning students' home use of computers is woefully dated. IT is a relentless and rapidly changing area of educational research and during the last decade alone the nature and extent of home computing has changed almost beyond recognition. The home PC market has mushroomed over the last 5 yr with the emergence of aordable multi-media machines with CD-Roms and access to the Internet and Electronic Mail. The marketing of home computers is now also ®rmly aimed at family and educational use rather than solely as games machines, re¯ecting the increasing capacity of aordable hardware as well as parents' growing awareness of the role IT is expected to play in their children's education. The vast majority of previous studies have also, as with much educational computing research (Selwyn, 1997b), been largely quantitative in nature. Whilst a quantitative approach is invaluable in providing a broad, substantive basis for research there is also the need for a more qualitative perspective on the nature of students' use of home computers and the subsequent
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eect this has on their use of IT in school. Thus the present study takes a combined approach to exploring students' domestic use of computers; ®rst presenting the results of a survey of students' use of IT both in and outside school, with further analysis based on data gained from subsequent interviews with students.
3. Methodology 3.1. Participants The data which form the present study took two forms. Firstly, as part of a larger research project into use of IT in 16±19 education (i.e year levels 12±14), questionnaires were administered to 983 students in Years 12 and 13 attending ®ve school-based sixth forms, one sixth form college and three tertiary/further education colleges in the South Wales area. All the students were in full-time education following either Advanced level courses (n = 698) or vocational courses (n = 285) such as GNVQs and BTEC quali®cations, and were all aged between 16 and 19 (mean = 16.92 yr). Of the 983 students, 55.5% were male (n = 546) and 44.5% were female (n = 437). Secondly, again as part of the larger research project, focus group interviews were held with students in every school and three of the colleges. In total 19 group interviews were held with a total of 96 students who had previously completed the questionnaires. Of the students interviewed, 58.3% were male (n = 56) with the remaining 41.7% female (n = 40). Fifty of the interviewees were following A-level courses with 46 pursuing vocational quali®cations.
3.2. Method I: questionnaire and Attitude Scale All the students completed the questionnaires in class time under the supervision of their teachers, who were supplied with written instructions. The whole survey consisted of six sections, the following four of which form the basis of the present study. 1. Demographic Information. Details of students' gender, age, year of study and courses and quali®cations sought. 2. Use of Computers Outside of School or College. Once students had indicated whether they had access to a computer outside of school or college those that had then indicated how often, and for what purposes, they used it. Students were required to rate how frequently they used a computer outside of school on a Likert-type scale ranging from 0±5 (where 0 = ``Never'', 1 = ``Occasionally'', 2 = ``Monthly'', 3 = ``Weekly'', 4 = ``Every 2/3 Days'' and 5 = ``Daily'') across a range of eight applications (``Games/Entertainment'', ``WordProcessing'', ``Art/Drawing'', ``Database/Spreadsheet'', ``Programming'', ``Internet'', ``EMail'' and ``Other''Ðwhere the respondent could specify any other application they used). 3. Use of Computers in School or College. Students then had to indicate how often and for what purposes they used a computer in each of the courses they were taking. This again
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took the form of a ®ve point Likert-type frequency scale across a range of nine applications (``Word-Processing'', ``Database/Spreadsheet'', ``CD-Rom'', ``Computer Aided Design'', ``Programming'', ``Simulations'', ``Internet'', ``E-Mail'' and ``Other''). Students could repeat this for a maximum of four subject areas. 4. Attitudes Towards Using Computers. This ®nal section consisted of Selwyn's (1997c) Computer Attitude Scale for 16±19 Education (16±19 CAS). This scale consists of 21 Likert-type statements divided into four subscales: anxiety of using computers, perceived control when using a computer, perceived usefulness of using a computer and behavioural attitudes towards using computers. Respondents rate themselves on each item on a ®vepoint Likert scale ranging from ``Strongly Agree'' to ``Strongly Disagree''. Selwyn (1997c) reported reliability (alpha) coecients for the four subscales with a sample of 16±19 students of 0.93 (anxiety), 0.88 (control), 0.82 (usefulness), 0.79 (behavioural), and 0.90 (overall). 3.3. Method II: focus group interviews Focus group interviews were then carried out with groups of between 4 to 8 students who had previously ®lled out questionnaires. Focus group interviews have been regularly used in social science research (Morgan & Spanish, 1984) and are recognised as an eective method of collecting qualitative data in an educational setting (Wilson, 1997). Each group interview lasted around 45 min and took a semi-structured approach designed to further explore the areas covered by the questionnaire and other factors in¯uencing students' use of computers in school and college. Of particular interest here are the data relating to students' domestic use of IT.
4. Questionnaire results 4.1. Students' access to a computer outside of school and college Over two-thirds of the students surveyed reported having access to a computer at home (68.2%, n = 670). However, male students were found to be signi®cantly more likely to have access to a computer at home than their female peers (w2=9.0659, P < 0.005). Interestingly, even greater dierences in home access were apparent between A-level and Vocational students (w2=20.8381, P < 0.00001). Whereas 72.5% (n = 506) of A-level students reported having access to a computer outside of school or college, only 57.5% (n = 164) of vocational students reported having similar opportunity to use IT at home. 4.2. Students' use of computers at home As Fig. 1 shows, students with access to computers outside of school and college made relatively extensive use of them, with over half using a home computer on at least a weekly basis. Similarly, Fig. 2 gives a breakdown of how each application is utilised on a weekly basis.
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Fig. 1. Frequency of students' use of IT applications at home. Data are percentage of students with home access to a computer (n = 670).
4.3. Home-using students' use of computers in school and college As Table 1 shows, although ``home-using'' students did not dier signi®cantly from students with no home access in terms of their overall use of IT in school or college, signi®cant dierences did occur regarding speci®c applications. The dierences in use of programming and simulation packages in school can be attributed to the subject dierences between students with and without a home computer, with home-using students more likely to be also taking high-using subjects such as IT and Design and Technology which involve the use of these specialised applications. Nevertheless, the fact that home-IT using students make more use of the internet and e-mail whilst in school and college suggests that they are more actively seeking out these ``optional'' applications which they have experience of using at home. However, students with use of a computer at home were not choosing to use more ``mainstream'' applications such as word-processing and CD-Roms at signi®cantly higher levels than students who exclusively rely on school or college for their access to IT. 4.4. The eect of using a computer at home on students' attitudes towards computers Students using a computer at home were consistently found to have more favourable attitudes towards computers than their non home-using peers. As can be seen from Table 2, signi®cant dierences were found between the two groups' attitudes towards using computers on all four attitude constructs, suggesting that using a computer at home gives students a considerable advantage, if not in actual level of school IT use, then certainly in their disposition toward using computers.
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Fig. 2. Students' use of IT applications at home. Data are percentage of students with home access to a computer (n = 670) using each application.
4.5. The eect of gender on home IT use As well as being less likely in the ®rst instance to have access to a computer outside of school and college, female students who did have access to a home computer were found to use domestic IT signi®cantly less often than their male counterparts (Mann±Whitney z = ÿ 8.5013, P < 0.00005). This division is illustrated in Fig. 3 which shows that male students are more likely to be using a home computer on a very frequent (i.e. daily/2±3 days) basisÐwhereas females are more likely to only be using a home computer on an irregular (i.e. monthly/occasional basis). Furthermore, as Table 3 shows, this gender-dierentiated use of home computers is signi®cant across all applications, apart from the ``Miscellaneous'' category. Moreover, although male students have higher levels of use across all applications, the preferences of home-users also diers according to gender. When students' regular use of home computers is Table 1 Home and non-home using students' use of IT in school and college
Word-processing Database-spreadsheet CD-Rom C.A.D. Programming Simulations E-mail Internet Overall use
Home computer (n = 670)
No home computer (n = 670)
Mann±Whitney Z
Signi®cance
2.13 1.28 0.94 0.94 0.86 0.25 0.16 0.40 2.58
2.04 1.14 0.84 0.32 0.49 0.09 0.08 0.27 2.38
ÿ0.9521 ÿ1.5952 ÿ1.4965 ÿ0.7590 ÿ3.5460 ÿ4.3289 ÿ2.1943 ÿ2.9118 ÿ1.7853
n/s n/s n/s n/s P < 0.0005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.05 P < 0.005 n/s
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Table 2 Students' scores on the 16±19 computer Attitude Scale Attitude construct Anxiety Perceived control Perceived usefulness Behavioural Overall attitude
Home computer (n = 670) 18.1642 14.7433 14.4299 11.2761 58.8134
Non home-users (n = 313) 16.2939 12.6262 13.1118 10.2013 52.2332
t-score 6.11 7.04 6.25 5.04 7.60
Signi®cance P < 0.0005 P < 0.0005 P < 0.0005 P < 0.0005 P < 0.0005
N.B. A higher score denotes a more positive attitude towards computers.
analysed (i.e. use on at least a weekly basis) it transpires that more boys prefer to play games than use a word-processor, whereas this trend is reversed for female students. Similarly relatively more female students prefer using art packages and the internet, whereas relatively more boys use databases, spreadsheets and programming. Students with access to a home computer were found to have signi®cantly more positive attitudes towards IT, both in the case of male students (t = 6.63, P < 0.0005) and females (t = 3.15, P < 0.005); albeit at diering levels of signi®cance. Two-way analyses of variance (2 2 ANOVAs) were then carried out to discover whether the bene®ts of using a home computer on students' attitudes were signi®cantly gendered. Although for both sexes using a home computer corresponds with higher attitudes, female students' attitudes are less signi®cantly improved by using a home computer in terms of their anxiety, perceived control and overall attitude towards computers (see Table 4). Thus the eect of being a home computer user (at least in terms of anxiety, perceived control and overall attitude) is signi®cantly dependent on students' gender. It must be borne in mind that using a home
Fig. 3. Frequency of students' use of IT applications at home by gender. Data are percentages of students with home access to a computer (n = 670).
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Table 3 Frequency of students' use of IT at home by gender
Word-processing Games Art/drawing Databases/spreadsheets Programming Internet E-mail Misc. Overall use
Male students (n = 394) 2.93 3.17 1.45 1.60 1.13 0.78 0.55 0.27 11.89
Female (n = 276) 2.55 1.77 1.01 0.98 0.39 0.41 0.31 0.18 5.03
Mann±Whitney Z ÿ4.1256 ÿ10.9675 ÿ4.5153 ÿ6.0578 ÿ7.1167 ÿ4.6750 ÿ3.7272 ÿ0.6791 ÿ9.3419
Signi®cance P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.00005 P < 0.0005 n/s P < 0.00005
computer has a positive eect for both sexes, but that boys seem to be bene®ting at greater levels from using a home computer than girls. So far from improving inequalities in students' attitudes towards computers, home computer use appears to be, if anything, increasing gender dierences. 5. Interview results On the basis of these questionnaire data, the interview section of the study sought to further explore two main areas of students' use of domestic IT. Firstly, its link with their use of IT in school and college and secondly, the in¯uencing factors behind the apparent gendered use of home computers. 5.1. Educational computing: the home/school divide It soon became apparent that the vast majority of students who had computer-related work from school preferred to work on their home computers. Students oered various reasons for this, primarily because working from home oered more conducive conditions, both temporally and contextually, for working on a computer: Table 4 2 2 ANOVAs showing the interaction eects between home computer use and gender on students' attitudes toward using computers
Attitude construct Anxiety Behavioural Perceived control Perceived use Overall attitude
Male Non-user (n = 152) 17.23 10.62 13.82 13.45 55.13
User (n = 394) 19.15 11.90 16.22 14.95 62.49
Female Non-user (n = 161) 15.41 9.81 11.50 12.79 49.50
User (n = 276) 16.37 10.40 12.63 13.68 53.08
f 4.35 2.69 5.05 2.12 5.68
Signi®cance P < 0.05 n/s P < 0.05 n/s P < 0.05
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Lewis ``There's a better environment there. . . you can have a bit to eat, watch a bit of T.V., do a bit of work. Rather than sitting in college where you've got to keep quiet and go on. . . [mimes tap, tap, tap action]'' [Business Studies Student] Jackie: ``I've got a computer at home and I just ®nd it easier, apart from my mum moans about the electricity. Its just easier, you've got exactly the same as they've got here [in school] but you've got 24 hour access and you can do things when you want to'' [Humanities Student] Many students also indicated that they preferred working on a computer at home because they could do so in relative solitudeÐas opposed to school where using a computer inevitably involved ``distraction'' from either teachers or other students: Michelle: ``I never use a computer in school because I've got one at home. There's no distractions there and there's no time limit either. I mean if you're sitting on a computer at school and there's someone behind waiting to use it you like rush it, do you know what I mean?'' [Art Student] William: ``You can use your computer at home whenever you want, there's no-one bothering you. Here you've always got teachers hanging around saying `go on there's other people that want to use them, do this, do that'. At home you can do what you like'' [IT Student] Similarly, for less con®dent students, access to a home computer allowed them the opportunity to experiment and explore using a computer in private, thus gaining the initial con®dence to use IT. This, they felt, could not be achieved in school: Peter: ``You just build a general knowledge of computers at home. I mean if you sit at home and you mess it up or something goes wrong. . . I suppose there's no-one sitting beside you to laugh for starters, so you can explore. When you're in school you get given a sheet and you load it up and follow the instructions. `Type this type that'. Its a waste of time'' [Modern Languages Student] Indeed many of the students with home computers felt that the ``freedom'' of working at home allowed them to work more eectively and ultimately produce work to a higher standard than would be possible if they were con®ned to working on computers in school or college: Tim: ``It aects how good your work is too. We can come home have a rest for an hour and then start on the work whereas they have to get on with it straight after lectures. So you've been concentrating all day and then after that you've got to do all your assignments. It can't help'' [IT Student] Similarly, those students without access to a computer at home were constricted by their lack of access to domestic IT, arguing that their school work suered as a result: Ceri: ``It means that we can't do as much work as we'd like to because we haven't got a computer, [on the course] we need to do all our work on a computer so if you haven't got one at home you can't work at home . . . it puts us back a bit'' [Health and Social Care Student]
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Jess: ``Over the weekend doing my biology practical I spent so much time writing it up by hand and then I made mistakes and I had to go and do it again and I thought `I'm not going to be able to do this when I go to university' and I felt really disadvantaged at not having a wordprocessor. So yeah, I feel disadvantaged. I mean, I couldn't go anywhere because it was the weekend and I didn't have time to use a computer in college'' [Physics Student] Nevertheless, for less experienced students the advantage of domestic IT was restricted. The distinction between school and home IT was so great for some students that they felt that they couldn't transfer IT skills learnt at home to the school setting: Jenny: ``I'm all right at home but I'm not con®dent on the ones in school. I was in business studies and we had these disks and they were all together and we had to pick one and we didn't know what we were doing and then you had to load to up and then all of a sudden you'd wipe something o and you didn't know what you were doing on it basically. I've got a more modern one at home which explains things better'' [Modern Languages Student] As this last quote suggests, this is often caused by the huge gulf between the quality of the hardware to be found in most schools and the comparative ``hi-tech'' IT environment that many students are used to using at home. Thus many students see themselves as using computers at home to compensate for a lack of quality IT resources at school: Phil: ``I think that if I didn't have a computer at home I wouldn't know what the hell to do when I have to use a computer in school. They don't teach you the right things here. In business studies they still use the old Amstrad computers which are about 20 years oldÐyou just sit there and laugh. . . Most of the computers [in school] are 286s and those ones with the green screens from the Stone Age. . . They're like nothing we'd ever have to use again. If I got a job using computers on the strength of those lessons I wouldn't have a clue what I was doing, whereas from using one at home I'd be all right. Its all modernised and tells you what to do'' [Modern Languages Student] 5.2. Gender distinctions in students' experiences of home IT When talking to students about how they originally got involved with using computers at home the link between boys' experiences of computers when children and adolescents and the use of computer games was quickly apparent. Many male students cited playing computer games as the initial stimulus for them to start using IT at home: Q: ``How did you ®rst start using computers?'' James: ``Just messing around on computers at home. . . I remember playing when I was very young. . .with just a bat and a ball on the screen and went on from there'' [Business Studies Student] When asked why they had been attracted speci®cally attracted to computer games students often found it hard to verbalise this appeal. Some male students did however mention the competitive, and sometimes violent, nature of such programs:
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Steve: ``It probably does start from games when you were young and boys seem more wanting to beat each other and play each other and then eventually they play loads and then they want to know how the game works. So it like progresses and your interest gets bigger as you mature'' [Chemistry Student] Rhys: ``Yeah, boys are always playing on computers when they're young, ®ghting games. . .and it goes from there. Mindless violence . . .'' [IT Student] However, male students generally seemed in agreement that girls were not attracted to using computers at home through similar means: Chris: ``Males innit, when they're little they get into computer games and when they're older they go on to do dierent stu, drawing on a computer. . . they just get into it don't they, girls just don't think of using computers when they're younger'' [Humanities Student] Rhys: ``There's is only one girl on our course. Its the games. Most of them are aimed at boys and that's how most people get into computers, through games. Nobody buys a computer just for the business stu. . . not originally. We used them more when we were young. We had consoles and that's where all the games were and the girls like didn't want to know'' [IT Student] Interestingly, the female students concurred with this sentiment in the interview groups: Fiona: ``It shouldn't be a male thing but it probably is. Boys always grow up . . .when I was playing with dolls my brother was playing on Gameboy and things and so after you win the game you want to do something more and more and then you've got to get bigger and bigger systems and they've got more interest in the whole thing'' [English Literature Student] Indeed, whereas male students seemed to have been initially attracted to computers through games and then continued to use computers on a regular basisÐboth still gaming and for other activities, female students were less enthusiastic. Many seemed dismissive, and even disparaging, of the leisure and games software: Fiona: ``And the games are all rubbish now anyway aren't they? Because all the games my brother has are . . . I mean when I used to play on computers it was all like Space Invaders and stu, but now its all like really good graphics and going round rooms looking for stu! It's like, he's got this game, `Harvesters' or something, and you just go round and round. Its just so boring, so what's the point of going round? Its like, you know, a maze game and they're all stupidÐthey've all got certi®cates on them, like 18. The only games that I like are like formula one games'' [English Literature Student] Katie: ``I prefer the games on the Nintendo because they're more skilful aren't theyÐwhen you have to walk round the walls and stu its just boring isn't it? Rubbish'' [French Student] There was also evidence that, when girls did use IT at home, this was only due to necessity rather than an on-going attraction. Indeed, some female students confessed to never touching a computer now for their studies although they had regularly done so in the past when requirement to do so was mandatory for the courses they were following:
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Andy: ``For GCSEs I used the computer at home all the time, everything I wrote for GCSEs would be rewritten at home on the computer but now. . . by the time I've written them up on paper ready to type them into a computer. By the time you've got onto the computer there's always something else that'll take me away from the computer, in the background, or your eyes start hurting. I just ®nd that I won't get it ®nished if I do it on the computer or it'll end up coming in late. It easier to write it up on paper'' [Humanities Student] Karen: ``It was an advantage when I was doing GCSEs because it saved me staying behind after school or in lunchtimesÐI could just go home and use the computer there. . . but now for A-levels I don't use it hardly ever'' [History Student] Helen: ``I think I don't use mine because I manage to get most of what I want to in college and so when I get home I think `oh I don't want to go on a computer again' unless I've really got something to hand in'' [Geography Student] This would seem to echo Shiann and Macleod's (Shiann & Macloed, 1986) contention that whereas boys are far more likely to be intrinsically interested in the computer, female students make far more pragmatic (and therefore sporadic) use of IT; only using a computer for a speci®c purpose and not for its own sake. Indeed, for many of the higher using male students using a computer at home still appeared to be a leisure activityÐappealing to male students both mentally: Keith: ``I like the logical elementÐthe whole packageÐI'm mad for it'' [Physics Student] Steve: ``Once you get your mind round it its just getting your mind round something working on a computer'' [IT Student] Chris: ``Its quite rewarding as well, if you get a program to work then its something. If you just written an essay then its like . . . great'' [IT Student] . . . and socially: Leigh ``Its just something to do isn't it? You can go round a mate's house and spend the whole evening playing on the computer. You have a laugh but you're also having to think and react all the time. Its a good waste of time really'' [Business Studies Student] However, many of the female students interviewed described using a computer at home as an anti-social activity which they were keen to disassociate themselves from: Fiona: [referring to another member of the interview group who had just been talking about playing games on his home computer] ``But he's boringÐhe's like `oh I don't do nightclubs, I don't go out' and stays there with his computer. All he does is work out and play on his computer. I don't want to be like that! That's probably why I don't like them actually because they're unsociable. I don't want to spend hours on my own playing on a computer'' [English Literature Student] Indeed, when justifying why they did not spend any of their leisure time using computers, female students were quick to portray themselves as more sociable and socially active than their male, computer-using peers:
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Alison: ``I think we're more interested in what's happening in the world than what boys are'' [Modern Languages Student] Nicola: ``Girls are more after boys, and boys are more after computers aren't they'' [Modern Languages Student] Ceri: ``Yeah, but then the boys who use the games have got nothing better to do'' [Leisure and Tourism Student] Charlotte: ``Yeah, cause we go out more often when the boys just stay in front of a computer playing games. . .we go out socialising'' [Art Student] However, this assessment was ironically more sympathetic when discussing a female peer who had temporally succumbed to using a home computer: Nicola: ``It depends doesn't it? It sucks you in. I mean Charlotte, when she ®rst got her Internet she wouldn't stop. She wouldn't go out until about nine o'clock. You'd get home from school and you'd try to phone her and she'd be engaged for about six hours. She wouldn't come out until she'd had her ®x'' [Modern Languages Student] Thus it seems that female students do not share the same enthusiasm for using computers outside of school and college as many of their male peers. For many girls at least who have not grown up with a culture of home IT use, a computer is a tool which can be used for some purposes in a school/compulsory context. Nevertheless, this utility does not seem to extend beyond school into girls' domestic and leisure time, within which female students are keen to distance themselves from computer use.
6. Discussion Twenty years since the emergence of the home computer market it is evident from this study how many more students now have access to domestic IT and how most are making regular and extensive use of it. This would seem to suggest that the home, rather than school or college, provides the primary IT experience for many students. In the light of the advantages that home computer use entails, increasing concern should therefore be shown for those students (a third of the overall sample) who are without access to domestic IT. As this paper has shown, the eect of home computer use on students' use of IT in school and college is not straight-forward; with home computer users only making signi®cantly more use of certain areas of educational IT (the internet and E-mail, and the more specialist applications such as programming and simulations). However, there was evidence from the interview data that the principal advantage that domestic IT users have is ready access to an often more sophisticated IT environment and, therefore, more access to the ``computer culture'' than would be possible from only using a computer in school. As Loveless (1996) argues, students' experiences of home computer use may not be entirely complemented by the nonvoluntary and educational nature of school IT use. ``The [computers'] most powerful learning toolsÐdatabases, spreadsheetsÐare also the least seductive to students, the least likely to utilise the dramatic graphics and sound eects adorning best selling computer games''
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(Loveless, 1996; p. 461). This re¯ects a common dichotomy of educational and home computer use. It may well be that, for some students at least, the educational IT environment lags so far behind their out-of-school computer use that they will not choose to use computers when in school or college. Therefore, home computer users have little reason to use school-based IT more, but the fact that they are making at least as much, if not more, use of computers in school and college than their non-home using peers, means that all their home-IT use is advantageous. In other words, students without access to a computer at home are not compensating for this by making extra use of school and college IT resources. Furthermore, the positive eect of access to a home computer on students' attitudes is irrefutable, with home users displaying signi®cantly more favourable attitudes towards computers across all domains. This is arguably more worrying for non-home using students as attitudes have been argued to be highly in¯uential in determining long-term computer-related behaviour (Selwyn, 1997d). Thus access to a home computer during a students' school career may be fostering advantages that will continue to be felt long after an individual has left school. The fact that home computer using students were found to have more favourable attitudes is hardly surprising given the established link between computer-related attitudes and positive IT experiences. From the interview data it is obvious that students are receiving far more positive experiences of IT from home than they are at school, which is only increasing the likelihood of them becoming lifelong IT users. The same cannot be said of the students who are solely relying on school or college for their computer use. It was disappointing however to discover that gender remains a divisive factor in students' use of home computers. As well as being less likely to have access to domestic IT, those female students that could use home computers were doing so both less often and for less applications, than their male counterparts. Furthermore, all the attitude-related advantages discussed previously were less pronounced for female home computer users than they were for males. So far from diminishing gender inequity, access to a home computer appears to be widening dierences (both in terms of use and attitude) between male and female students. There was also a noticeable reticence amongst female interviewees toward getting involved too heavily with IT or to be seen as a ``computer user''. So it may well be that general stereotyping of using computers is the key mediating factor in the apparent gendered eects of students' home computer use rather than domestic IT itself. Given the heightened importance of domestic IT use suggested by this study, there is clearly a need for future research investigating the characteristics of those students using computers at home but, more importantly, those students without access to home computers who are therefore put at a considerable disadvantage. Although this study has been successful in highlighting gender as a salient factor other areas demand equal attention. Schall and Skeele (1995) highlight potential impediments to home computer use as cost, software quality, gender bias and family background. There is therefore clearly a need to further explore the role of socioeconomic dierences in access to home computers (Milone & Salpeter, 1996). Social class has been found to be a factor in adult learners' access to home computers (Selwyn & Moss, 1997), but further research is required to assess its importance in an educational context. Equally, more longitudinal and comparative research is also needed to examine how students' home use of IT changes with age. If an early involvement with games does lead to more serious and prolonged involvement with computers in later life we need to understand
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more fully the relationship between home-computer activity and students' disposition and engagement with school-based technology as they progress through their educational career. In practical terms, schools and colleges should therefore strive to make IT experiences more positive so that females and non-home using students are not disadvantaged as they currently are and so that access to a home computer ceases to become as much of a bene®t. As the lower levels of female home IT use suggest, this may not be so much a case of increasing access to computer resources but encouraging students to want to use IT. Similarly, teachers should show awareness of those students without access to domestic computers and ensure that these students are not discriminated against, especially in terms of use of new information technologies such as the internet and E-mail. Over the last two decades, research has consistently shown that educational computing is a divisive factor in schools and colleges. As this paper has shown, the role of students' domestic use of IT cannot be overlooked or underestimated in this equation.
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