SIGCUE OUTLOOK Vol. 26 #2 April 1998 PREDICTORS OF SATISFACTION FOR DISTANCE LEARNERS: A STUDY OF VARIABLE CONDITIONS Patricia Boverie, Liza Nagel, Melissa McGee, a n d Susan Garcia. Key Words: Distance learners, social presence, student satisfaction, learning strategies, self-efficacy, emotional intelligence, learning style Introduction One-quarter of Americans represent a significant proportion of our citizens who continue to live in the relative isolation of rural communines where access to higher education is challenging if not impossible (U.S. Census, 1990). When organized in a highly interactive manner, teleconferencing can offer a cost-effective solution to the more traditional methods of educational delivery to rural communities (Parham & Wood, 1985; Passaro, McEvoy, & L a t h a m , 1991; Schaeffer & Schaeffer, 1993). Although it is currently thought that distance learner satisfaction plays a significant role in determining the effectiveness and success of a tele-education course (Biner,1993), very tittle has been done to explore how learnerrelated factors could influence these satisfaction levels. A comprehensive review of the fiterature on distance teaching (Dillon & Walsh, 1992) identifies factors such as social presence and audience characteristics as potentials for future study. It was the goal of this study to fill the
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