Directions for Future Research in On-line Distance Education

Although institutions have invested much in developing on-line environments or using already established commercial platforms, only few studies have been conducted to investigate the effectiveness of on-line courses based on empirical data (Jung and Rha, 2000). A review of the literature conducted in this study showed that most of online learning studies investigated the effectiveness of Web-based interaction or Internet conferencing on learning, not the entire learning environment. Even in those studies that investigated entire on-line environments, student achievement was the most common indicator for evaluation and no other indictors or factors, which may influence students’ achievement, were investigated. This study sheds light on current research in online learning and provides guidelines for future research needed in this area.