Community of Inquiry, Self-Efficacy, and Student Attitudes in Sustained Remote Health Professions Learning Environments

Abstract The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of Community of Inquiry (CoI) presence types and self-efficacy on perceived student attitudes within a sustained remote learning environment. As institutions must remain ready for modality-altering situations, a better understanding of CoI and self-efficacy in sustained remote teaching and learning environments may help address gaps in current practices and perceived student attitudes. An interinstitutional team of health professions education researchers from six U.S. universities collected survey data from 205 health professions students representing a wide range of professions in five U.S. institutions. Latent mediation models under structural equation modeling framework were used to examine whether student self-efficacy mediates the relationship between CoI presence and student’s favorability of sustained remote learning delivered in the prolonged stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results showed that higher levels of teaching presence and social presence in the remote learning environment were associated with higher levels of remote learning self-efficacy which, in turn, predicts variance in positive attitudes toward remote learning. Only direct effects for cognitive presence and self-efficacy on the favorability of sustained remote learning were observed. CoI presence types explained 61%, 64%, and 88% of the variance respectively in student’s favorability of sustained remote learning. Theoretical implications of this study include the establishment of the CoI and its three presence types as a relevant and stable framework for investigating sustained remote health professions teaching and learning environments, not only carefully designed online learning environments.