Perceived Risks and Psychological Well-Being in Online Education: Implications for Grade Expectations and Future Enrollment

Abstract

Due, in part, to the recent economic conditions, new models of education are creating unprecedented competition to the traditional models of the university (Jones 2012). The dual challenges of providing high-quality services and controlling costs continue to drive educational institutions to seek creative solutions. The 2011 Survey of Online Learning reveals that the number of students taking at least one online course has now surpassed 6 million. Nearly one-third of all students in higher education is taking at least one online course; and 65 % of higher education institutions now say that online learning is a critical part of their long-term strategy (Allen and Seaman 2011; Johnson et al. 2011).

The growth trend for online education has resulted in an increased availability of online courses and online degree programs offered by for-profit universities as well as traditional colleges and universities. Theoretical literature and empirical research that focus on online education and online learning (aka e-learning) address a variety of questions, including perceived quality (Udo et al. 2011), perceived risk (Mohamed et al. 2011), satisfaction and behavioral intentions to enroll in future online courses (Udo et al. 2011), the learning styles, expectations, and needs of online students (Mupinga et al. 2010), and student knowledge and confidence in a variety of study-related skills (Pryjmachuk et al. 2012) in a quest to find ways to increase the effectiveness of online education. The results of the empirical research, however, are mixed (Sharples and Vavoula 2005), and the empirical rigor of some of the work has been questioned (U.S. Department of Education 2010).

Thus, the purpose of our study is to expand the understanding and knowledge in the field of online education. Accordingly, the present study examines perceived risk of online education through perceived performance risk and perceived psychological risk; and psychological well-being perceptions through measures of autonomy, environmental mastery, and personal growth. Hence, our study is the first to date to examine psychological well-being in an e-learning environment. The findings show that the lower the psychological risk, the older a student, and the more online courses s/he has taken previously, the more likely a student intends to enroll in future online classes. The findings further show that the lower a student’s age, perceived psychological and perceived performance risks, and the higher a student’s environmental mastery the better the student expects to do in the class. In addition, the lower a student’s perceived performance and perceived psychological risks the higher the student’s grade expectations. Interestingly, however, the more online courses a student has previously taken, the lower his/her grade expectations.