Digital technology and eWOM in the context of higher education: a study from Portugal and Spain

ABSTRACT

Higher education is currently undergoing a revolution with the widespread use of electronic tools in classrooms. Simultaneously, personal opinions are increasingly stronger and more expressive resulting in electronic Word-of-Mouth (eWOM). This article presents two studies. The first study exposes students’ opinions about higher education and digital technology by a qualitative analysis. It also confirms that students use constantly their electronic devices to keep informed and updated. The second study focus on eWOM effects and follows a quantitative approach on two samples of students from two different countries by using the Fuzzy Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis. It supports the influences of eWOM on learning performance, likeability concern, student-instructor interaction, and responsiveness. It also shows that cultural differences may explain differences between those links. This research provides actual insights on awareness about digital technology in higher education.

KEYWORDS:

• Higher education
• digital technology
• electronic Word-of-Mouth
• content analysis
• Fuzzy Set QCA

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the editors and the anonymous reviewers for their help in developing this article. Furthermore, we would like to thank the Research Centre in Digital Services (CISeD) and the Polytechnic of Viseu for their support.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article was originally published with errors, which have now been corrected in the online version. Please see Correction (http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08841241.2020.1850202)

Additional information

Funding

This article is funded by National Funds through the FCT – Foundation for Science and Technology, I.P., within the scope of the project Refª UIDB/05583/2020.