Abstract
Purpose Social media can be an effective tool in health care education. The purpose of this study was to explore dental hygiene educators’ familiarity and use of social media platforms and to examine how social media was implemented in dental hygiene education.
Methods A 25-item questionnaire was designed to investigate the use of social media by dental hygiene educators. The instrument included demographic data and items addressing personal, professional, and educational use of twelve common social media sites and the respondents’ beliefs about social media using a 4-point Likert scale. The electronic questionnaire was distributed by email to 379 dental hygiene program directors in the United States and Canada. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data.
Results A total of 120 responses were received. While Facebook was the most utilized site for personal use (78.3%), LinkedIn was the most frequently accessed site for professional use (57.5%), and YouTube for educational use (68.3%). There was strong agreement that the interactive nature of online technologies create better learning environments (84.1%). There was also strong agreement that social media use in the classroom invites student participation (77.5%). More than half of the respondents (64.2%) indicated that social media can be an effective method for content delivery.
Conclusion Social media is highly utilized for personal use by dental hygiene educators, but less frequently for engagement purposes in the classroom.
INTRODUCTION
As society has emerged from the global pandemic, education has shifted from more traditional delivery methods to distance learning modalities.1 To meet the needs of the current Gen Z (born between 1997-2012) student population, educators must evolve their delivery methods to make content more relevant and engaging. Gen Z students have been shown to prefer immediate information and videos, via search engines, over more traditional methods such as lectures and the reading of textbooks.2 They are comfortable accessing, and frequently preferring technology to supplement their learning.2,3 Social media (SM) has been found to be essential in information retrieval, distribution of learning materials, videos and discussions.4 Social media has been broadly defined as the sharing and creation of content posted through online applications.5,6,7 Social media usage in the United States (US) has grown from just 5% of Americans participating in 2005, to over 72% engaging in SM use in 2021 with over three quarters (84%) of people living in the US ages 18-29 reporting using at least one SM site.8 Individuals in an older demographic reported less frequent SM use, with 45% of American adults over sixty-five years of age participating on one SM site.8 Considering that a majority of dental hygiene students fall into a younger cohort, there may be a disconnect between older faculty members and their use of SM.
Dental educators must remain current with clinical and scientific advances in addition to supporting digital literacy for their students.9 Faculty must also evolve in their teaching methods to engage and involve students in their own personal learning.10 The literature has shown that students prefer e-learning platforms as a supplement to the traditional information delivery.3,11 Petrucci et al. stated that educators should incorporate SM into their teaching strategies to be inclusive of the individual learning needs of students.12 Most educational research has centered on social media sites as a method of communication among students, between faculty and students, and among faculty.13 Results from Arnett et al. concluded that faculty communicate on a varying array of SM platforms due the wide range in age among faculty and students.5 The SM platforms included: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and Pinterest.5 Considering what has been identified regarding student learning preferences, incorporating SM in dental hygiene education should be performed with intention, based upon sound evidence of effectiveness as a tool.
Dental hygiene students have expressed preferences for the use of technology in the classroom.14 Nguyen and Patel found that while both dental and dental hygiene students recognized the benefits of online learning, the dental hygiene students indicated a preference for in person classroom instruction.15 Additionally, in a second study of the role of using Instagram for anatomy education, Nguyen et al. found that dental students supported the use of SM as a supplement to traditional classroom learning.16
Social media, when combined with more traditional means of information delivery, may positively impact students with varying learning styles. Using SM to support the Social Learning Theory, faculty are not only able to encourage students to observe, imitate and model others’ behaviors, but also activate critical thinking.17 Social media can support different learning styles and student creativity in the classroom. Concerns expressed in the literature discuss the ability of faculty to add more tasks to an already full teaching schedule, and a lack of funding to support the purchase of educational technologies by schools.11 Ortadeveci et al. found that innovations by faculty in teaching strategies could assist students in the learning process.18 In order for faculty to successfully integrate the use of SM in the classroom, it would be beneficial to receive the necessary training to improve their level of understanding and comfort with emerging programs and applications.18,19,20 The use of SM has been shown to engage students at their level of interest, help improve written communication skills, and provide for creativity in content delivery methods.8,19-21
Students expect faculty to create a learning environment supplemented with the technological advances that have become an essential part of their daily lives. With the digital progression in the classroom, limited research existed on the intentional use of social media as an educational modality in dental education. While the abrupt transition to online learning at the beginning of the pandemic in 2020 forced the implementation of technology into all learning environments, little was known about the attitudes of dental hygiene educators towards the use of SM. The literature does not demonstrate whether resistance to implementation of social media in education is generational (age dependent) or experiential (due to a lack of understanding of systems).11 The purpose of this study was to explore dental hygiene educators’ familiarity with and use of SM platforms and to examine how SM is implemented into dental hygiene education.
METHODS
This non-experimental, cross-sectional quantitative study was deemed exempt by the Institutional Review Board at The Ohio State University (#2018E0715). The sample population included faculty of accredited dental hygiene programs in the United States and Canada whose teaching responsibilities included a minimum of one didactic class in the dental hygiene program.
The survey instrument was developed to assess the current and past use of social media by dental hygiene educators. A 25-item questionnaire was adapted from the instrument on social media and teaching used by Seaman and Tinti-Kane23 in which participants were provided with a list of twelve common social media sites and asked to indicate which SM platforms they used for personal, professional, and educational purposes. The questionnaire included six demographic questions and twelve author-developed statements on beliefs regarding SM usage and three free-response opportunities asking respondents to describe how they used SM. Respondents indicated their agreement or disagreement with the statements according to a 4-point Likert scale. Several items allowed the respondents to select multiple answers and respondents were not required to complete all questions. The questionnaire was pilot tested for clarity and content by a small focus group of eight dental hygiene faculty. Minor revisions for word choice were made to the questionnaire after pilot-testing.
The survey was distributed to 379 program directors in the United States and Canada via email using an electronic survey site (Qualtrics; Provo, UT, USA). Program directors were asked to forward the email to their full-time faculty. A reminder email was sent at the two-week interval and the survey remained open for one month. Data were collected from September through December of 2018.
Data were evaluated to analyze the different types of platforms utilized for educational purposes. No power analysis was conducted, as this was an observational study. Descriptive statistics were utilized to compare the respondent’s age and frequency of use for personal, professional (networking), and educational (teaching/didactic) purposes. Specific comparisons were made on the utilization of SM both inside and outside the classroom and its utilization for personal, professional, and educational use among dental hygiene educators.
RESULTS
One hundred and twenty-two participants accessed the survey and a total of 120 surveys were completed and used for data analysis. An exact response rate could not be calculated because the number of faculty members at each institution is unknown. Respondents were not required to answer each question; a few (n=7) chose not to provide demographic information A majority of the respondents (63.0%) were forty-six to sixty-five years of age and over 70% of all respondents had fewer than twenty years’ experience as a dental hygiene educator. Most respondents (92.5%) taught in an institution located within the US. The largest cohort of respondents were from community college settings (38.9%) followed by dental school settings (27.4%) and four-year public or private institutions (27.4%). Demographics are shown in Table I.
Respondent Demographics (n = 113)
The twelve most common SM sites used for personal, professional, and educational purposes are shown in Table II. The four most frequently SM sites for personal use were Facebook, Facebook Messenger, YouTube, and Pinterest. Conversely, the lowest utilized sites for personal use were Google Hangouts, Tumblr, and Reddit. For professional use, a majority of respondents indicated that they used the site LinkedIn followed by Facebook and YouTube. For educational use, the primary sites used were YouTube and Facebook. Access frequency to SM sites was evaluated (Table III). The results indicated that the vast majority of respondents accessed SM at least once a day for personal use. Responses related to access to social media for professional use were more evenly distributed. Respondents indicated using SM sites for educational purposes less than once per week.
Social media site use by category (n = 120)
Frequency of social media usage by category (n = 118)
Facebook utilization was highly dependent on respondent age, with higher usage by respondents over the age of forty-five. The SM site YouTube had the greatest use for educational purposes with higher utilization among respondents over the age of forty-five. All age groups used Pinterest exclusively for personal use. Social Media site utilization is shown in Table IV.
Social media site use by age (n = 120)
Respondents were asked a series of questions to assess their level of agreement about SM utilization in an educational setting (Table V). There was strong agreement (mean score=3.27) that the interactive nature of online technologies created better learning environments. There was also strong agreement (mean score=3.09) that SM use in the classroom invited student participation. Additionally, respondents believed that mobile technologies allowed students to complete their assignments more easily. A majority of respondents (52.5%) were not in agreement with the statement “I have sufficient time to integrate social media in my classroom.”
Beliefs about social media (n = 120)
The survey instrument included three free response items, asking respondents to “please describe how you use SM personally, professionally, and in the classroom. “Common themes were:
Personal use (n=65) Most indicated that they used SM to stay connected with family and friends. Several respondents expressed a concern about the lack of privacy on SM.
Professionally (n=54) One-third indicated that they used SM for networking, naming LinkedIn specifically. Some stated that they used SM to stay connected with their professional association while others remarked that they used SM to seek employment opportunities.
In the classroom (n=51) Most indicated that they used SM in the classroom by showing videos, with over one-third naming YouTube specifically.
DISCUSSION
The purpose of this study was to explore dental hygiene educators’ familiarity with and use of SM platforms, both personally and professionally, and to examine how SM is used in dental hygiene education. The vast majority of respondents believed that SM could be an effective method for content delivery and that the interactive nature of online technologies created better learning environments for todays’ students. Additionally, the majority believed SM use in the classroom invited student participation. Respondents indicated that a lack of familiarity with the various SM platforms inhibited social media implementation in their classrooms and a majority felt they did not have the time to integrate SM.
The benefits of SM use in the classroom have been shown to include increasing student engagement, implementing active learning strategies, utilizing higher order cognitive skills of Bloom’s taxonomy, and the advantage of portability and searchability of social media.24 Gukian et al. found that while Facebook (58%) was the most popularly used SM platform used by medical students (58%), YouTube was the most frequently used platform for educational content (29%).25 Furthermore between one third and one half of the medical students used SM for educational purposes on a daily basis.25 Furthermore El Bialy et al. highlighted that the difference in medical educators’ use of YouTube was only 22% versus the 43% use reported by medical students. They also found that over one quarter of the medical educators were unaware of the use of SM sites for educational purposesand they indicated concerns regarding privacy, distractions, and wasting time.26 In a review of the literature of nursing education, Ross et al. found that 90% of undergraduate nursing students used SM. However, it was also recommended that it was critical for faculty to evaluate video content for accuracy and for suitability for the discipline and course objectives.27
Results from this study indicated that YouTube was the most frequently accessed and utilized SM site for educational use across all age groups. Educators have been shown to consider embedding YouTube content into lecture and/or online presentations as a form of progressive educational technique.28 While respondents in this study indicated using YouTube within their courses, it was not known whether the participants were creating their own content and publishing it via YouTube or if they were using previously created content. Video conferencing sites (e.g. Google Hangouts, Zoom) were popular vehicles for connecting with students. As more students requested either online access to course information or delivery of content, video conferencing has been shown to be an effective way to increase cognitive presence and create a sense of community with today’s students.28,29
Utilizing SM in the classroom requires using a platform that is familiar to both the faculty member and the students. Facebook was the platform that was shown to have the broadest utilization personally by the respondents, however the age demographic of Facebook users skewed away from the average age of most dental hygiene students. Students’ familiarity with Twitter, Pinterest, and YouTube makes these viable platforms to consider for educational use. One option identified for future use collaboration in the classroom with SM was the use of pin boards. Students could search sites (e.g., Pinterest) and create themed or subject boards to gather information pertinent to the topic of choice. The pin boards have permanence beyond graduation as the student can carry this resource into professional practice. Concerns regarding privacy, legal and ethical issues for content resourcing and sharing should be discussed with students prior to assignments on SM sites. It is also important to review and refer to an institutions’ policies on SM use prior to implementation in the classroom.30 While the majority of respondents stated that they did not have adequate time to integrate SM into their classroom, results from a study by Ansari et al, indicated that faculty would use SM in the classroom more if they had additional support from their institution.31
During the pandemic, the innovation in education was propelled via necessity, and the shift in educational delivery methods will most likely not return to pre-pandemic content delivery. Cho and Hong found that most faculty were not fully using virtual classrooms and digital technologies prior to the pandemic, but post-pandemic many faculty indicated their preference for this paradigm shift due to less travel, convenience, reaching a wider audience, and continued interaction with attendees.22 They cautioned that faculty need to understand and embrace the current use of technology, and the inherent risks associated with a virtual classroom such as limited Internet access, software issues and potentially less interaction among students/faculty.22 Utilizing the pre-pandemic data of this study to compare with post-pandemic faculty practices creates an opportunity for future research. Understanding dental hygiene educational delivery methods and digital technology uses will set the foundation for future innovation.
This study had limitations. Self-selection and non-response bias may have influenced the responses with those engaged in SM more likely to respond to the survey.32 The survey instrument was adapted from a previous instrument and only pilot tested for content and usability. A formal validation of the tool was not completed. There were also limitations in inferential analysis due to small sample sizes in the subgroups. The need for a larger sample, based upon apriori power analysis, would have enabled more robust statistical analysis. In this study, older educators were over-represented in the sample. Over 63% of the respondents were over the age of forty-five. The age demographics in the US show that 49% of dental hygiene educators are over the age of fifty33 and in Canada, reports indicate that over 47% of dental hygiene faculty are over the age of forty-nine.34
It should be noted that the data for this study were collected prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, which broadened the use of learning technology platforms across higher education. Exploring the use of SM for various purposes post-pandemic may yield different results among dental hygiene educators. For future research, it would be beneficial to study student perceptions of the use of SM in the classroom. Ascertaining the students’ preference for specific platforms utilized in dental hygiene education would be of interest and allow better correlation with faculty familiarity with SM platforms.
CONCLUSION
Results of this study indicate that dental hygiene educators have a high level of engagement in SM for personal use, regardless of age. YouTube videos were the most common SM site used in the classroom. While dental hygiene educators were open to SM integration in the classroom, adequate time was cited as a barrier. Current students expect engagement and content delivery that is both portable and easily accessible. Dental hygiene educators could achieve both through using SM in the classroom.
DISCLOSURES
The authors report no outside financial support or conflicts of interest.
Footnotes
NDHRA priority area, Professional Development: Education (evaluation).
- Received August 10, 2023.
- Accepted February 12, 2024.
- Copyright © 2024 The American Dental Hygienists’ Association
