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Journal of Education for Business
ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
College Student Choice Among Electronic and
Printed Textbook Options
Dmitriy V. Chulkov & Jason VanAlstine
To cite this article: Dmitriy V. Chulkov & Jason VanAlstine (2013) College Student Choice Among Electronic and Printed Textbook Options, Journal of Education for Business, 88:4, 216-222, DOI: 10.1080/08832323.2012.672936
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08832323.2012.672936
Published online: 20 Apr 2013.
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ISSN: 0883-2323 print / 1940-3356 online DOI: 10.1080/08832323.2012.672936
College Student Choice Among Electronic
and Printed Textbook Options
Dmitriy V. Chulkov and Jason VanAlstine
Indiana University Kokomo, Kokomo, Indiana, USAThis empirical analysis focuses on student choices among electronic, new, and used printed textbook media. No significant relationship between textbook medium choice and student performance or demographic characteristics was observed. Ease of use and purchase and learning style were considered by students while cost and ability to keep the book have the most significant influence on medium selection. Results imply that multiple textbook media allow students to self-select the option that works best for them.
Keywords: business education, electronic, instructional media, textbooks
Students and colleges face a greater range of textbook options than ever before. Technological progress leads to increased availability of alternative ways to access textbook content. In addition to new and used printed textbooks, instructors and students may have the choice of electronic textbooks in file format, electronic textbooks accessed over the Inter-net, and electronic versions of a textbook with the right to print (Young, 2010a, 2010b). Manufacturers of hardware de-vices such as tablets, smart phones, and e-readers are paying growing attention to the textbook market (Kolowich, 2012; Young, 2012), which is bound to increase electronic textbook adoption by colleges and students. According to industry pro-jections (Reynolds, 2011), the share of electronic textbooks will increase from 3% of the market at the end of 2011 to 35% in 2016.
Textbook publishers experiment with various pricing models (Beezer, 2009; Blumenstyk, 2008; Stewart, 2009). In some cases, the online access to textbooks is even offered free of charge, and only printing rights are sold for a fee (Shelstad, 2011). Lower cost electronic options for textbook content access provide an important factor in increasing the adoption of electronic texts. Several universities advocate a model of required electronic textbook use (Young, 2011).
The growth in the popularity of electronic textbook op-tions and the advent of required e-textbook adoption in some universities raises the question of the impact of electronic
Correspondence should be addressed to Jason VanAlstine, Indiana Uni-versity Kokomo, School of Business, Kokomo, IN 46904–9003, USA. E-mail: javanals@iuk.edu
textbooks on teaching and learning. There is a growing body of research that addresses the impact of adopting an electronic textbook (Baker-Eveleth, Miller, & Tucker, 2011; Shepperd, Grace, & Koch, 2008; Woody, Daniel, & Baker, 2010). The focus of these studies is on whether student per-formance and satisfaction are affected by the use of elec-tronic textbooks. The reported results are mixed. For in-stance, Shepperd et al. did not find any significant differences in student performance between ones that used a printed text-book and ones that used an electronic text. However, the students using the electronic textbook in this research re-ported less time spent reading and did not rate the electronic textbook favorably. Woody et al. reported similar findings that achievement of learning outcomes was not significantly different between students using printed and electronic text-books. However, there were differences in the learning habits and student preferences as students that used a printed text-book were more likely to report using the text-book for exploring captions and charts. Furthermore, most students strongly pre-ferred the experience of using a printed textbook. In contrast, Dennis (2011) reported the results of a pilot study that re-quired the use of electronic textbooks in certain classes at Indiana University. The students participating in this study reported preference toward electronic books with the cost providing the most important factor in e-textbook preference. In addition to lower cost, the literature has identified several advantages that electronic textbooks may provide. Baker-Eveleth et al. (2011) argued that paper textbooks may quickly become outdated while electronic ones are easier to keep current. Instructors have the option of customizing and updating textbook content with an online textbook (Miller &
COLLEGE STUDENT TEXTBOOK CHOICE 217
Baker-Eveleth, 2010). Furthermore, the electronic format of the textbook essentially changes the mechanism of interac-tion with the student and allows new ways of engagement (Dorn, 2007). This factor helps promote the principles of universal design (see Scott, McGuire, & Foley, 2003) and improves inclusiveness for students with disabilities and di-verse learning styles. Various digital textbook formats pro-vide search capability and may be annotated (Nicholas, Row-lands, & Jamali, 2010). Dennis (2011) reported that the extent of usage of these annotation features is significantly linked to student performance. Electronic access to textbook content may be complemented by additional collaborative and inter-active technologies such as blogs or wikis. These technolo-gies commonly referred to as Web 2.0 tools involve instruc-tors and students in content development (Ravid, Kalman, & Rafaeli, 2008) and have the potential to enhance student engagement and learning (Contreras-Castillo, Favela, Perez-Fragoso, & Santamaria-del-Angel, 2004).
Challenges to the acceptance of electronic textbooks come from such factors as the students’ lack of comfort in reading from a computer screen and having been trained to use tra-ditional printed textbooks (Carlson, 2005). Shepperd et al. (2008) argued that an important disadvantage is the fact that students are required to have access to a computer as well as an Internet connection for some e-textbooks. This limits the usefulness of an electronic textbook as the students cannot take it everywhere they go, and are limited in taking notes during lectures and studying during short breaks. Having the electronic textbook available as an e-reader file answers some of these concerns.
In this study we attempted to complement the literature on several accounts. First, we report data on electronic textbook use in an extensive sample of students from nine sections of Economics courses at a regional campus of a public uni-versity in the U.S. Midwest. We confirm the results of such studies as Shepperd et al. (2008) and Woody et al. (2010) in that the demographic characteristics are not significantly correlated with the selection of an electronic textbook and that the use of an electronic textbook is not significantly correlated with student performance. Second, we provide evidence that addresses an important gap in the existing lit-erature in focusing on student choice among various textbook options. We explore the factors that influence student choice among several available textbook media options with a sur-vey. Survey results indicate that students rate cost, ease of use, ease of purchase, and learning style as important fac-tors for the textbook selection decision. Third, we perform logistic regression analysis that leads to an empirical model of the factors that significantly predict student choice. In this model, student decision is presented as a two-stage process. At the first stage, we demonstrate that students identifying cost concerns as an important decision factor are more likely to choose the online or used textbook format. The likelihood of choosing a new textbook is negatively correlated with cost, but positively correlated with the desire to keep the textbook
for future reference. At the second stage, we focus on the subsample of students that did not choose a new book and demonstrate that those students that identify the ability to keep the textbook as an important factor are more likely to choose a used textbook over an online version. Understand-ing these factors that guide student decisions on textbook formats helps form policy choices at the university and the instructor levels. The variety of factors that may influence student choice demonstrates that forcing a single textbook option, whether printed or electronic, may not be in the best interest of students. All students do not approach textbook selection in the same way, and having multiple textbook op-tions has the potential for improving student experience in a course.
METHODOLOGY
This study is based on a survey performed in nine sections of introductory Economics courses at a regional campus of a public U.S. university. Over 90% of the students present in class completed the surveys providing a sample size of 158 responses. These courses were taught by two different instructors and utilized two different textbooks. Four course sections with 83 survey participants used Textbook A, that was a well-established textbook from a traditional publisher (Mankiw, 2012). This textbook was available as a new printed book for$180.50, as a used printed book for$144.40 at the
college bookstore and as low as$110 at online booksellers,
and as an electronic book for$96. The other five sections with
75 survey participants used Textbook B from a publisher that promotes an alternative business model and makes electronic textbook available over the internet free of charge (Shelstad, 2011). This textbook (Rittenberg & Tregarthen, 2009) was also available as a new black-and-white printed book for
$39.90 and as a used printed book for$31.90.
In order to study factors that affect student choice and performance, the survey focused on three types of questions. A copy of the survey instrument appears in the Appendix. First, the survey established the demographic information for each student. Second, a series of questions were asked regarding the importance to the selection decision of factors such as cost, ability to keep the book, and ease of use. These factors were measured numerically with a 5-point scale. The possible responses on the Likert-type scale ranged from 1 (least important) to 5 (very important). Finally, open-ended questions asked the participants to explain in writing their reason for the selection of the format they used.
Table 1 presents summary statistics for the survey. The statistics are reported for the overall sample, as well as for each of the two subsamples that used the two different text-books. The survey that the students completed asked them to identify the textbook medium that they selected from six options that can be found in the appendix. We generalized these choices into three categories by eliminating choices
TABLE 1 Summary Statistics
Complete sample Textbook A Textbook B
Participants 158 83 75
Male 52% 55% 48%
Female 48% 45% 52%
Business majors 43% 41% 49%
Nonbusiness majors 57% 59% 51% Nontraditional age 22% 19% 25% Average overall grade 83% 84% 82% Chose new textbook 15% 10% 20% Chose used textbook 62% 85% 37% Chose online textbook 23% 5% 43%
that no students selected and by uniting the international edition available for one of the textbooks with used editions. From the cost standpoint, the international edition was close to the used book price level. It was not an advertised option, and few students selected it. Ultimately the students’ choices are grouped into three categories: new, used–international (hereafter used), and online.
Note that the demographic characteristics of the two sub-samples are remarkably similar however the choices they made were different. Only 5% of the students selected the online version of Textbook A, while 43% selected the on-line version of Textbook B. The cost of the onon-line and the used textbooks available from each of the two publishers in absolute terms as well as in relation to the cost of a new textbook was quite different and may be reflected in the ulti-mate choice of the format by the students. Such differences observed by the course instructors motivated the research questions explored further in this study and the development of the empirical model described in the following section.
RESULTS
Textbook Medium and Performance
The first research question we explore is whether students’ performance in the course was influenced by the textbook medium they selected. Ordinary least squares regression was used to evaluate the relationship between textbook medium selection and classroom performance. Table 2 presents the results of the coefficient estimates for this regression. Aca-demic performance is measured by a student’s percentage of points earned on all assignments. The independent vari-ables were a vector of demographic varivari-ables including gen-der, age, class standing, and the student’s major, along with dummy variables to indicate whether the student chose an online textbook or a new textbook.
As Table 2 shows, no relationship was found between classroom performance and textbook medium choice (i.e., no particular choice of textbook format was a reliable in-dicator of classroom performance). Additionally, several
TABLE 2
Textbook Medium Choice and Academic Performance
Dependent variable is academic performance Coefficient (β) t Student chose online textbook. −2.032 1.07 Student chose new printed textbook. −1.281 0.56 Student was male. −0.885 0.57 Student’s age was 24 years or less. −0.286 0.14 Student’s class standing was freshman. 2.703 1.03 Student’s class standing was junior. −2.393 1.29 Student’s class standing was senior. 0.796 0.27 Student’s major was nonbusiness. 1.738 1.06
Constant 83.967 35.56∗∗
Note.nobservations=158.dffor allts=149.
∗∗p=.01.
demographic variables indicating gender, age, and class standing were included. None of these included demographic variables were found to have any significant relationship with classroom performance. These results are consistent with re-sults previously reported in such studies as Woody et al. (2010) and Shepperd et al. (2008).
Demographic Characteristics and Textbook Choice
One of the distinguishing features of this study was the subjects’ ability to self-select the treatment protocol (i.e., students chose the textbook medium that they preferred). This leads to the second research question as to whether any observable demographic characteristics are accurate predictors of textbook choice. Logistic regressions were used to evaluate this relationship. In these regressions the dependent variable is a dummy variable that indicates whether a student chose a specific textbook medium. The independent variables were demographic variables that indicated the gender, age, class standing, and major.
The estimation results are reported in Table 3. Column 1 shows the results of the estimation with a binary depen-dent variable indicating whether or not an online textbook was chosen. Column 3 shows the results of the estimation with a binary dependent variable indicating whether or not a new printed textbook was chosen. Columns 2 and 4 mimic columns 1 and 3 respectively, except that the age variable is dropped due to its correlation with class standing and the class standing dummy variables are collapsed into one vari-able that indicates whether a student is a junior–senior or not.
Table 3 shows that most of the demographic variables studied did not impact the textbook medium that was se-lected by the students in these classes. No significant re-sults were found to support a link between textbook selec-tion and gender, age, or major. However, it was discovered
COLLEGE STUDENT TEXTBOOK CHOICE 219 TABLE 3
The Effect of Demographics on Textbook Medium Selection
1. Dependent variable is 1 if online book chosen
2. Dependent variable is 1 if online book
chosen
3. Dependent variable is 1 if new printed
book chosen
4. Dependent variable is 1 if new printed book
chosen
β t β t β t β t
Gender was male. −0.244 0.62 −0.194 0.50 % 0.655 1.36 0.626 1.32 Age was 24 years or less. −0.037 0.07 −0.826 1.53
Class standing was sophomore. −0.743 1.32 1.013 0.92 Class standing was junior. −1.466 2.18∗ 1.416 1.25 Class standing was senior. −1.687 1.73† 1.438 1.13
Major was nonbusiness. 0.661 1.56 0.577 1.40 −0.099 0.20 −0.046 0.09
Junior+senior −0.899 2.01∗ 0.714 1.48
Constant −0.572 0.79 −1.173 3.15∗∗ −2.604 2.20∗ −2.413 4.90∗∗
Note. nobservations=158.dfvalues=151 (Regression 1), 154 (Regression 2), 151 (Regression 3), and 154 (Regression 4).
†p=.10.∗p=.05.∗∗p=.01.
that juniors and seniors were both less likely to use an on-line textbook than freshmen and that juniors and seniors grouped together were less likely to choose an online text-book than freshmen and sophomores grouped together, as indicated by the significant coefficient estimate of –0.899 in column 2.
Factors Affecting Student Choice
In addition to evaluating the performance of students, we were interested in the reasons why students selected a partic-ular textbook format. As students’ demographic information did not provide insight into the textbook choices that students made, we moved on to examine the importance of several factors that the authors believed students would consider when making their selection. These factors were identified based on instructor expectations and literature review and include (a) ability to keep the book after the semester, (b) cost (see Dennis, 2011; Redden, 2011), (c) ease of purchase, (d) ease of use (see Baker-Eveleth, 2011), (e) student’s learning style (Shepperd et al., 2008; Woody et al., 2010), and (f) student’s technological ability (Dennis, 2011). Students were asked to use a 5-point Likert-type scale to report how important each of the factors were in their decision, with responses ranging from 1 (not important at all) to 5 (very important). These answers were given during the semester after their textbook decision had already been made.
Table 4 summarizes the means and standard deviations of the student responses. Due to the presence of missing answers, the number of observations ranged from 156 to 157.
The mean of these responses provides some insight into the importance of these factors for the students in their text-book selection decisions. Cost and ease of use have the high-est mean responses with the lowhigh-est variances, sugghigh-esting that these factors are generally identified as very important for students when they select their preferred textbook
for-mat. Ease of purchase and learning style were also viewed as important factors by these students, with mean values between neutral and important on our scale. Ability to keep and technological ability were not as important, having mean values closer to the neutral response on our survey. None of these factors alone provides policy implications for instruc-tor or university-level textbook format decisions, but they do show that students consider both cost factors and fac-tors related to their ability to effectively use the textbook to learn course materials in making their decisions in this study.
Table 4 also reveals another important detail from the sur-vey results in the variance of the student responses for the importance of each of the factors considered. The fact that the student responses are not highly concentrated indicates that the students in our sample differ in the factors that influ-ence their decision. This result is has important implications for policymakers in higher education. As technology moves forward and new advances in textbook markets emerge, in-structors should consider textbooks that allow students to self-select the format that works best for them. For instance, even when online textbooks provide benefits on account of cost and interactive features, choosing the online textbook
TABLE 4
Student Responses on Factors Considered When Purchasing a Textbook
Variable n M SD
Ability to keep 156 2.75641 1.397564 Cost 157 4.598726 0.741273 Ease of purchase 157 3.847134 1.15562 Ease of use 157 4.178344 1.00322 Learning style 157 3.821656 1.146361 Technological ability 157 3.33758 1.474371
Note.Scale minimum was 1 and maximum was 5.
format exclusively would benefit some students at the ex-pense of others. The same can be said for an instructor that continues to offer only a printed textbook option to students. Having observed the wide variation in factors that af-fect student choice of textbook format, we explored how the students’ ranking of the importance of these factors in-formed their choice of textbook medium. In searching for predictable patterns in the variation of student responses in relation to their textbook choices, we found that a two-stage model of the decision process fares well in describ-ing the survey results. Figure 1 provides a visual repre-sentation of this decision model. In this model, students first choose whether or not to buy a new printed textbook. Next, students that did not select a new textbook make the choice between a used printed textbook and an online textbook.
In order to explore this decision-making process empir-ically, we estimated the model using a two-stage, logistic regression. In the first stage the dependent variable was a dummy variable that indicated whether a student selected a new textbook or not. In the second stage the dependent variable was a dummy variable that indicated whether a stu-dent selected an online textbook. In the first stage all stustu-dent responses were used, while in the second stage only the students that did not select a new textbook were evaluated. The independent variables for both stages were the vector of survey responses indicating the importance that each stu-dent placed on each of the factors that we considered. A dummy variable indicating class standing was also included because it was shown to be related to textbook selection in Table 3.
The results of the stage 1 and stage 2 estimations are reported in Table 5 in columns 1 and 2, respectively. The results indicate that students are more likely to purchase a new printed textbook if keeping the textbook is important to them or if cost is not an important factor for them. Twenty-three students of the 156 that completed the survey made this decision to purchase a new textbook. This indicates that although the ability to keep did not appear to be an important factor for the students in this survey based on the mean response stated in Table 4, it was a more important positive factor for the students that chose a new textbook than for those that did not, all other things considered. Our estimates from stage 2 indicate that the ability to keep the textbook was
TABLE 5
Factors Affecting Textbook Choice
1. Stage 1 dependent variable is 1 is new
printed textbook chosen (n observations=156)
2. Stage 2 dependent variable
is 1 is online textbook chosen (n observations=133)
β t β t
Ability to keep 0.522 2.74∗∗ −0.395 2.32∗ Cost −0.601 1.98∗ 0.29 0.83 Ease of purchase 0.281 1.00 0.017 0.08 Ease of use 0.321 0.88 −0.014 0.06 Learning style −0.241 0.76 0.047 0.21 Technological ability −0.036 0.17 0.042 0.24 Junior+senior 0.813 1.62 −0.692 1.52 Constant −2.444 1.48 −1.503 0.85
∗p=.05.∗∗p=.01.df values=148 (Stage 1 regression 1), and 125
(Stage 2 regression).
also an important factor for predicting the decisions of the remaining 133 students. The coefficient estimate of –0.395 indicates that students that placed a higher value on the ability to keep their textbook were less likely to choose the online textbook. It is possible that cost was not an important factor in predicting the second decision due to the smaller gap between used textbook prices and online textbook prices.
Also important was the lack of significant results for pre-dicting textbook choice based on ease of use and learning style. The survey means reported in Table 4 indicate that both of these are important factors that students consider when making textbook format decisions. This combined with the lack of significant results in Table 5 indicates that both students who choose online texts and those that chose more traditional published versions made these decisions in part based on their unique learning style and the ease of use that they find through each textbook option. This provides strong support for allowing students to select their own textbook format as opposed to an instructor choosing one format over the other. Additionally, our results indicate that technological ability does not seem to be a strong barrier to online textbook adoption as it was ranked the lowest in importance of the six factors considered and did not seem to be correlated with the
FIGURE 1 Textbook selection process (color figure available online).
COLLEGE STUDENT TEXTBOOK CHOICE 221
actual decisions that students made when other factors were considered.
CONCLUSION
The availability of textbook medium options is on the rise as traditional choices of new and used printed textbooks are complemented by online, electronic, and customized printed textbooks. Technological advances lead to increased interest in the impact of electronic textbooks on higher education. Policymakers consider changes such as the required use of electronic textbooks in the hopes of reducing the costs of education (Dennis, 2011). We examined the factors that in-fluence student selection of textbook medium from a range of options. Our results suggest that this selection process is not a simple decision driven by a single factor, even one so powerful as cost. We demonstrate that in our sample student decision on textbook format selection may be presented as a sequential model where students first choose whether to buy a new printed textbook, and then students that did not select a new textbook make the choice between a used printed text-book and an online one. Several conclusions follow from our empirical analysis.
First, policymakers in higher education and instructors should consider textbooks that feature multiple available for-mats and allow students to self-select the format that works best for them. The wide variation in the factors that stu-dents see as important in selecting textbook format suggests that a single format policy is not optimal. Even when online textbooks provide benefits identified in the literature such as lower cost and interactive features, choosing the online textbook format exclusively would benefit some students at the expense of others that would prefer a printed book. The same can be said for an instructor that continues to offer ex-clusively a printed textbook to students without an electronic option.
Second, while we do not find any significant impact of the textbook format selection on academic performance, the results suggest that some students see value in printed text-books that is not provided by electronic ones. Those students that are not concerned with cost are more likely to choose a new printed textbook. Among the ones that did not select a new textbook, the ones that see ability to keep as an important factor are more likely to select a used printed textbook.
Finally, demographic variables have not provided any significant relationship with students’ textbook format se-lections. Neither has their self-reported level of techno-logical ability. Our study has not identified any specific barrier to the acceptance of electronic textbooks; rather it shows that students may be well served by variety in format offerings.
The potential limitations in this study include the fact that the data were collected on a regional campus of a large state
university. While the data show demographic variety and come from nine course sections taught by different instruc-tors with two different textbooks that each provided a range of format options, additional validation from large-campus, urban, or international schools will be helpful. The data were collected in a business school and an application of the em-pirical model identified in this study may be best suited to student choices in such schools.
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APPENDIX—Survey Instrument Questions for this Study
Name:
Gender (circle one):
Male Female
Class standing (circle one):
Freshman Sophomore
Junior Senior Graduate
Age (circle one): 24 or below 25 or above
Major:
1. Which format did you use for the course textbook? (Not all options may be applicable.)
Online book
Published book (new) Published book (used)
Published book (international edition) Audio book
No book used.
2. Using the following scale, please evaluate each of the following factors that you considered when choosing which version of the textbook to use/purchase:
5 –Very important,4 –Important,3 –Neutral,2 –Not very important,1 –Least important
Ability to keep the book for future use: Cost:
Ease of purchase: Ease of use: Your learning style:
Your technological abilities:
3. Why did you choose the version of the book that you used?
4. Do you see value for you in having multiple ver-sions/formats of the textbook? Please explain why or why not.
