In this Chapter, the researcher conducted a one-shot case study as identified earlier in the Chapter to validate the contextual framework, which has resulted from the previous intervention as shown in Figure 8.1 and to answer the research questions and test the hypotheses listed above. The following conclusions were driven from the hypotheses testing:
H8.1 and H8.2: Perceived ease of use and trust are both positively correlated with secure email.
H8.3: Trusted email is positively related to perceived ease of use of the email.
H8.4: Perceived ease of use is positively related to perceived usefulness of the email.
H8.5: Perceived ease of use is negatively related to actual usage of email.
H8.6: Perceived usefulness is not related to actual usage of email.
Thus, the framework depicted in Figure 8.1 has been validated for only hypotheses 8.1 to 8.4. In other words, the researcher can confirm that secure email and trusted emails lead to ease of use, which in turn lead to usefulness. Moreover, ease of use relates to usefulness which is already validated by (Hubona & Burton-Jones, 2003). However, the
result of this case study clashes with (Hubona & Burton-Jones, 2003) because H8.5 was accepted but with negative correlation. In other words ease of use and usefulness have a significant relationship but it is negative which cannot validate the frame work. Additionally, H8.6 is rejected. Thus, there is no relationship between perceived usefulness and actual usage of email. Therefore, we can conclude that the research frame work is not validated.
Moreover, descriptive analysis shows that many of the participants indicated that they have used email for learning occasionally, and about one third (30.8%) rarely. However, 8.8% of the participants used email for learning regularly. Additionally, the email service used most frequently by the participants was Hotmail (40.7%).
Quantitative and qualitative analysis indicated that UOB participants were not aware of how to use secure emails for learning purposes. This was clear from the interviews and observations which support the hypotheses analysis. The following limitations prevent validation of the framework:
1- Lack of the students‘ and teachers‘ knowledge of security settings in email; 2- The teachers do not motivate their students to use the email in the learning; 3- UOB administrators do not encourage the students and teachers to use UOB
university email;
4- The researcher spent time to explain to the students how to secure emails. This let the students to think that these were lectures and they felt bored;
5- The researcher had difficulties finding a sample of students that were willing to adjust their security settings;
6- Some of the students were not cooperative with the researcher in that they did not use the emails in the learning during the case study.
The researcher will conclude the study in the next Chapter with discussion, recommendations and conclusions sections.
Chapter Nine: Discussions, Recommendations
and Conclusions
9.1. Introduction
This study aimed at conducting research in order to produce an innovative design model for the secure email usage to support the learning process focusing on Bahrain. The specific objectives of this study were to determine the effectiveness of the proposed design model to enhance learning, and to identify where the proposed design model could be adapted to enhance teaching in other countries and subjects.
In the first stage, initial study (described in Chapter 4) was carried out to identify the primary issues and problems faced by both students and teachers while applying OCG tools in the learning process. The primary research was conducted with students using a quantitative questionnaire, and with teachers using qualitative interviews in Bahrain. This research had the broader objective of examining the experience of OCG tools usage by both the students and faculties.
In the second stage (Chapter 5), a quasi-experiment was carried out with the students at UOB. The aim of this experiment was to identify the perception of the students towards security, privacy, safety, usage of SWFG during the learning process. This quasi- experiment mainly produced quantitative data, but to a lesser extent also collected qualitative interviews, log files and observation data
In the third stage (Chapter 6), email examined in the previous stage was further evaluated with respect to security using student feedback from both qualitative and quantitative methods in the form of a questionnaire and informal observation and interviews. This was because the experiment conducted by the researcher in the previous
stage indicated that email does not have a high level of security. Hence, the researcher conducted a survey in order to reveal the students‘ awareness towards the secure email. In the fourth stage of this study (Chapter 7), an intervention was carried out in order to monitor a clear picture of secure email usage by the participants during 24 hours. This activity confirmed the previous stage in that it demonstrated the participants‘ reaction and awareness of secure email.
Finally, in the fifth stage (Chapter 8), the research framework was validated using a one- shot case study to test the security dimensions: namely, secure email, trusted email, perceived usefulness, and perceived ease of use. The following sections present the discussions of the main findings of this study.