Current Trends in Educational Technology Research
Authors: Loredana Mihalca, Mircea Miclea
Published in: Cognitie, Creier, Comportament (2007-03-01)

ABSTRACT Educational research has moved through several stages or ages, focusing at the beginning on the content to be learned, then on the format of instructional messages and, finally on the interaction between computers and students. The present paper reviews the research in technology-based environments in order to give both a historical perspective on educational research and a view of the current state of this discipline. We conclude that: 1) trends in educational research were forged by the evolution of theories and the technological changes, 2) a clear shift from the design of instruction to the design of environments can be noticed; 3) there is a positive effect of educational on learning, but the size of the effect varies considerably; 4) is much more dependent on the activity of the learner than on the quantity of information and processing opportunities provided by the environment. KEYWORDS: educational technology, computer- based learning, environments, research methods, virtual reality. Computer and the tremendous development of information technologies over the last few years have transformed the way education is conducted nowadays (Lou et al., 2001). Although computer has the potential of a powerful and flexible tool (Scardamalia & Bereiter, 1996), the previous experiences with the integration of early technologies in schools (e.g., radio, television, early computer-assisted instruction) underline the fact that the mere installing of hardware does not lead to desired results (Clark, 1983). Thus, the main question, research tried to find an answer for, was and still remains whether computer is benefic for the process and if yes, in which conditions? The proper research of educational technology has represented the subject of a debate for more than a decade (Lagemann, 2000; Levin & O'Donnell, 1999; Shavelson & Towne, 2002; Slavin, 2002). Despite of the accumulated experience in conducting research and publishing results in specialized journals, there is no consensus regarding methods that are used, or results and interpretations that are given to them (Hannafin, 2006). Reeves (1993) claimed that an important part of the research in the educational field is pseudoscience, because it fails in meeting the high level of theoretical, conceptual, methodological and/or analytical requests of the paradigm that it is based upon. The purpose of this article is to review the research performed in the educational field in order to understand the nature of questions and problems that researchers had to face in this field over the years, and also to place the current research in the context of educational research. THE EVOLUTION OF RESEARCH IN EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY The field of educational found its origins in the discovery made by researchers and practitioners of the fact that the instruction can be planned, projected, evaluated and revised before being applied on students. In other words it can be treated as an object on which a set of procedures, (i.e., technologies) can be applied (Winn, 2002). Educational is, according to the definition of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT), ...the theory and practice of design, development, utilization, management and evaluation of processes and resources for learning (Seels & Richey, 1994, p. 231). Another definition is the one offered by Reisser (1987), who states that educational is the systematic way of designing, utilization and evaluation of the teaching/learning process, in terms of specific objectives, based on research in human and communication fields and on combining human and technical resources. The research made in the educational field, according to Winn (2002) has moved through four stages or ages, each being built on the previous one and each of them being characterized by a specific focus, specific theoretical assumptions and practical implications. …