Guidelines for applying the research model in other universities or contexts

As mentioned in section 8.2.3, the research model could be adopted and tested empirically in other universities or contexts. However, there are some guidelines suggested for teachers who are interested in implementing Facebook for mobile learning. The pre-requisites include (1) Facebook is not prohibited by the government, (2) Facebook is widely adopted by university students, (3) Majority of students have smartphone where they can access Internet via school WIFI or their cellular service providers, (4) teachers are willing to use Facebook for teaching, and (5) normal

classroom rather than computer lab is preferred. In order to facilitate student learning using mobile Facebook, teachers should (1) plan carefully the in-class Facebook mobile learning activities in conjunction with class lecture and sample activities are shown in figure 5.6, (2) consider group activity instead of individual activity so as to encourage discussion, communication, interaction and brainstorming, (3) prepare course materials in digital formats, for instance, pdf, jpg, audio, video, etc. which are supported by smartphone, (4) require students to post their responses by means of taking photos or videos so as to minimize the impact due to smartphone physical limitations, and (5) be ready to reply student Facebook messages promptly anywhere anytime, especially, after-class. Besides, there were seven factors to consider so that students can adopt Facebook for mobile learning:

(1) Performance expectancy: The Facebook learning activities should make good use of students’ hand-on IT experience, for instance, they are required to find YouTube short video link explaining about Omni-channel marketing and post it on Facebook. Students prefer demonstrating their abilities of searching and sharing.

(2) Effort expectancy: The Facebook learning activities should be simple and direct, for example, letting students like or dislike certain issue, or let student vote by choosing a choice so that they have little effort while participating.

(3) Hedonic motivation: The Facebook learning activities should contain elements to promote pleasure, enjoyment and expressiveness. For instance, (a) mobile individual or group competition-based learning activities; and (b) individual idea contribution or group collaborative knowledge sharing activities, can be considered to motivate students intrinsically.

(4) Habit: Teacher should make good use of Facebook notification by posting course related information frequently or daily, for example, quick quiz (using Facebook vote feature), post tiny learning tips, in order to develop student habits of visiting the group anywhere anytime.

(5) Social presence: The Facebook learning activities should with more interaction and communication, for example, students are required to reply their idea to teacher’s post.

(6) Interactive learning: The learning activities should make use of the wall of the Facebook study group so that students can post the information they search from internet and get feedback from teachers.

(7) Device usability: The Facebook learning activities should make good use of audio and video recording when students are required to post information. It is inconvenient for students to use virtual screen keyboard to type lengthy messages.

8.5 Research limitation and improvement

There are some limitations in this research. Firstly, the sample size is relatively small (N=123). Future research should increase the sample size to ensure a more representative sample. Furthermore, this limitation is one of the weaknesses in a scientific method of research, i.e. this research fails to handle a large number of variables with limited sample sizes (Gay, Mills & Airasian, 2011; Donaldson, 1996). Although this weakness was explained in previous chapters and compensated using qualitative research for triangulation and further exploration, the impact of this weakness could not be eliminated. Do these seven determinants contribute to the successful implementation of Facebook for mobile learning? In spite of the significant quantitative result, it is believed that there are other factors influencing students’ adoption of Facebook for mobile learning, and the subsequent successful implementation (Wang, Wu & Wang, 2009). Secondly, this study was conducted by a case study of a course at SCS in Hong Kong. The research findings are not completely representative and cannot be generalized (Creswell, 2013; Johnson and Onwuegbuzie, 2004). The same cohort of students was invited to participate in the study where non- parametric tests revealed that there were significant gender and age group differences in variables. Thus, age and gender should be considered in future research. Therefore, the theoretical research framework can only be applied to the Hong Kong context that students are ‘millennials’ (Generation Y). Thirdly, this research investigated specifically the adoption of Facebook for mobile learning. Can mobile learning using Facebook be generalized across higher education globally (Bosch, 2009)? Although Facebook is a social networking site (SNS) widely used worldwide, there are countries which ban its use, for instance, North Korea, Iran, China, Cuba and Bangladesh. The reasons behind the prohibition include cultural conflicts, political issues and government decisions (Index, 2014). Therefore, the theoretical research framework of using Facebook private study groups for mobile learning cannot be applied to countries where Facebook is unavailable. Fourthly, this study makes use of

multiple linear regression to analyze the causal relationships between seven independent variables and one dependent variable because it is assumed there are no indirect relationships among variables and the linear relationships exist among variables (Maxwell, 1975).

However, these limitations can be improved. The small sample size limitation can be improved by increasing the sample size by inviting more teachers and students to participate in the research so that more constructs can be considered in the research model. The case study limitation can be improved by increasing the scope and depth of the research. This can be done by inviting students of different universities to participate in this research so that the research model can be more representative and generalized. The Facebook-prohibited limitation can be improved by inviting university students of different ‘Facebook-allowed’ countries to participate, so that the research model can be more representative and generalized. Multiple cases can improve the generalizability and replicability of the research model (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2012).