Students Vote: A Comparative Study of Student Perceptions of Three Popular Web-Based Student Response Systems

One way to use formative feedback to increase student engagement is through a student response system (SRS). Originally appearing as classroom “clickers,” very little literature exists concerning the ease of use, usefulness and integration, and overall satisfaction of current SRS software smartphone applications. Using the technology acceptance model as a guide, this study uses a mixed methods approach concerning student perceptions of three distinct SRS used in multiple sections of a university undergraduate statistics course. The quantitative results demonstrated significant differences between SRS, while follow-up qualitative questions clarified the Likert-scale data. “All else being equal, the easier system is to interact with, the less effort needed to operate it, the more effort one can allocate the other activities” (Davis 1989, p. 334). With all data considered, students preferred the Socrative app over both TopHat and Learning Catalytics.