TIME PATTERNS IN SOCIAL NETWORKS AND LEARNING SUCCESS AMONG ONLINE STUDENTS

Online learning provides the opportunity to work on academic tasks at any time while doing other activities, such as using web 2.0 tools. This study identifies factors that contribute to success in online learning from the students’ perspective and their relationship with time patterns. A survey of learning outputs was used to identify relationships between students’ satisfaction, knowledge acquisition and knowledge transfer and the time spent working on academic tasks. In this study, 198 students from a university in Mexico completed the survey. These results are also contrasted with the perspective of their instructors, who responded to a corresponding survey. The findings suggest that knowledge transfer has a significant association with the number of hours spent online per day, hours spent on social networks and the use of e-learning during working hours. Learner satisfaction has a strong relationship with the time in years that a learner has been using the Internet and the number of hours devoted to the course per week. The findings of this research will be helpful for faculty and instructional designers when implementing learning strategies.