UNDERSTANDING CULTURAL DETERMINANTS OF MOOCs OFFERING: A CROSS-COUNTRY STUDY

Massive Open Online Courses, also known as MOOCs, figure as the main trend in the international educational market in recent years, characterized by the offer of free, open access and global courses. Although many current studies address issues like design, quality and acceptance of these courses, l...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Turkish online journal of distance education TOJDE 2020-10, Vol.21 (4), p.195-205
Main Authors: MALAQUIAS, Fernanda Francielle De Oliveira, JUNIOR, Romes Jorge Da Silva
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Cultural Differences
Cultural Influences
Educational Technology
Electronic Learning
Higher Education
Individualism
Large Group Instruction
Masculinity
Online Courses
Power Structure
Social Influences
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Summary:Massive Open Online Courses, also known as MOOCs, figure as the main trend in the international educational market in recent years, characterized by the offer of free, open access and global courses. Although many current studies address issues like design, quality and acceptance of these courses, little attention has been given regarding cultural aspects that could influence this global open learning movement. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to investigate cultural determinants of MOOCs offering, through a crosscountry analysis. To this end, four cultural factors proposed by Hofstede were considered. Through the multivariate regression analysis, we evaluated the relation between these factors and the number of MOOCs offered in each country. The results show that Individualism presents a significant and positive effect on MOOCs offering. Power Distance, Uncertainty Avoidance and Masculinity dimensions of culture do not present significant effect on MOOCs offering. This means that although individuals from countries with higher rates of Masculinity and lower levels of Uncertainty Avoidance and Power Distance are more likely to attend online courses, universities in these countries are not necessarily the ones offering more MOOCs. The results of the study may be useful to support the implementation of strategies for the diffusion and internationalization of MOOCs.
ISSN:1302-6488
1302-6488
DOI:10.17718/tojde.803405