Engineer

British Journal of Educational Technology doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2009.00937.x Vol 41 No 2 2010

307–323

The impact of individual differences on e-learning system satisfaction: A contingency approach

Hsi-Peng Lu and Ming-Jen Chiou
Hsi-Peng Lu is a professor of Information Management at National Taiwan University of Science and
Technology. Ming-Jen Chiou is a PhD student at National Taiwan University of Science and Technology and a lecturer at St. John’s University. Address for correspondence: Ming-Jen Chiou, Department of
Industrial Engineering and Management, St. John’s University, No. 499, Sec. 4, Tam King Road Tamsui,
Taipei, Taiwan. Email: [e-mail]

Abstract
This study investigated the impact of contingent variables on the relationship between four predictors and students’ satisfaction with e-learning. Five hundred and twenty-two university students from 10 intact classes engaging in online instruction were asked to answer questionnaires about their learning styles, perceptions of the quality of the proposed predictors and satisfaction with e-learning systems. The results of analysis of variance and structural equation modelling analyses showed that two contingent variables, gender and job status, significantly influenced the perceptions of predictors and students’ satisfaction with the e-learning system. This study also found a statistically significant moderating effect of two contingent variables, student job status and learning styles, on the relationship between predictors and e-learning system satisfaction. The results suggest that a serious consideration of contingent variables is crucial for improving e-learning system satisfaction.
The implications of these results for the management of e-learning systems are discussed. Introduction
During the past 20 years of Web technology development, a web-based learning system has been widely used in higher education (Kim & Bonk, 2006). There are many benefits
to

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