BIO

I am a sophomore and expect to graduate in May 2025. I am a pre-med student majoring in psychology and minoring in chemistry. My goals after graduating from FSU are getting into medical school and doing my residency in psychiatry. I am interested in research concerning psychology and neuroscience.

Webcams and Attention in the Online Classroom

Abstract

During the 2019 pandemic we saw a major change in education. To keep everyone safe, schools and universities shifted from in-classroom teaching to an online virtual classroom experience. Eventually the use of virtual learning became more normalized and its use is now more prevalent and mainstream than ever before. The way in which courses are being taught changed drastically, and so have the way students learn. The use of webcams was implemented to bring a more immersive approach to try and emulate face-to-face classes as much as possible and now it is widely used in online classes. But how did this method of virtual schooling with webcams affect the students? The ‘Webcams and Attention in the Online Classroom’ study looks into how webcams affect students' attention and engagement. This is part of a broader study that looks into the relationship between a student and the webcam and how it could affect their attention to class, assimilation to a new setting with different norms, and privacy concerns, among other things. It also looks into the difference between these when the choice of turning their webcams on or off is given. The study will use full text reviews, surveys, and interviews to explore and understand how the use of webcams encourage or discourage the students to learn in an online setting.

Keywords: education, online, learning, synchronous, webcams