Explaining students’ attitudes toward books and computers

Despite the increasing and now ubiquitous use of computer technologies, previous research by the authors has indicated a preference for using books over computers in the learning context. This paper presents a follow-up study, which investigates why there is this preference for books amongst the undergraduate population. It was found that findings from the previous study were replicated; namely, attitudes toward books were significantly more positive than attitudes toward computers. Further, significantly more respondents expected to learn more from books than computer-based material, and preferred to learn from books than computers. Reasons for these preferences included practical usability issues, media-related usability, experience and aesthetic values.