A multi-level longitudinal analysis of 80,000 online learners: Affective-Behaviour-Cognition models of learning gains

One of the challenges facing higher education is understanding what counts for an excellent educational outcome. Historically academic performance was a variable of choice for measuring 'excellence' in education, but more recently a concept of learning gain, which can be defined as change in knowledge, skills and personal development across time (e.g., Andrews et al., 2011; Boyas et al., 2012) gained momentum. Educational research also mainly looked at cognitive gain largely ignoring affective changes (attitude) and behaviour (Tempelaar et al., 2015a). Current research aims to address this gap by developing and testing an Affective-Behaviour-Cognition model of learning gains using longitudinal multilevel modelling. The learner-generated affective-behaviour-cognition data was retrieved from university database for 80,000+ undergraduate students who started their degree in autumn 2013/14. The preliminary multilevel modelling revealed that cognitive and behaviour learning gains are well explained by the hypothesised Affective-Behaviour-Cognition model, whereas the more complex affective learning gains model needs further refinement. The main strength of this research is that approach used is a practical and scalable solution that could be used by teachers, learners, higher education institutions and the sector as a whole in facilitating students' learning gains by further improving and personalising provision of higher education.