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How proactive personality promotes online learning performance? Mediating role of multidimensional learning engagement

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Abstract

Research on online learning effectiveness has experienced a shift towards focusing on learner characteristics or differences. However, little attention has been paid to learners’ personality traits, especially those that highly match with the environmental characteristics of online learning. Guided by recent active learning approach and Model of student differences for learning in online education, this study adopts proactive personality (a dispositional tendency to be active, goal-oriented, and not constrained by environmental forces) as a key predictor and examines whether its relationship with online learning performance is mediated by learning engagement as a multidimensional construct. Using a multi-method approach (including self-reports, log file analysis, and content analysis), this study collected both subjective and objective measures of learning engagement from a total of n = 322 undergraduates. Results showed that proactive personality was positively associated with online learning performance. In addition, this association was mediated by all subjective and certain objective measures of learning engagement. Findings contribute to understanding the impact of proactive personality on online learning performance and the interplay of learners’ individual factors and learning engagement factors in online learning environments. This study recommends promoting learning engagement to realize learners’ online success, especially for those with low levels of proactive personality.

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Data Availability

The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

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Funding

This work was supported by the Postdoctoral Science Foundation Funded Project of China under Grant [2021M700463]. No competing financial interests existed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Research Center of Distance Education, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China

    Huanyou Chai

  2. Faculty of Artificial Intelligence in Education, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China

    Tianhui Hu

  3. School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, China

    Gengfeng Niu

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  1. Huanyou Chai
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  2. Tianhui Hu
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  3. Gengfeng Niu
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All the authors had the same role in Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis and investigation, writing- Original draft preparation, etc.

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Chai, H., Hu, T. & Niu, G. How proactive personality promotes online learning performance? Mediating role of multidimensional learning engagement. Educ Inf Technol 28, 4795–4817 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639-022-11319-7

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