Enhancing interactivity in an online learning environment

This study focuses on of the use of animation to alert students to incoming messages and system updates in an online environment. It describes an experiment which compares an animation- and a text-based interface in terms of how the students perceived the alerting system. Relationships between the number of interactions, performance, and perceived social presence are examined. The result, indicate that the animation-based interface group interact more than the text-based interface group and perceptions of social presence might be stronger for those students who post more messages. In addition, the results suggest that those students who perceived a stronger social presence also performed better. These findings have implications for designing online course environments where the design of the interface should be considered as a variable that enhances social presence.