students’ perceptions of time management and deadlines: a special challenge in e-learning-based...

Student’s Perceptions of Time Management and Deadlines: A Special Chal-lenge in E-Learning-based Cross-Cultural Education

Thomas Richter Information Systems for Production and Operations Management

University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany [email protected]

Abstract: This paper addresses the students’ cultural understanding of time management. In our study, which was conducted between 2010 and 2012 and mainly took place in the academic context of Germany and South Ko-rea, we found out that the students’ perception of time management is strongly related to their culture. When edu-cation takes place in cross-cultural settings, which related to Internet-based education in future will be the stan-dard-setting, this particular difference can lead to major frustration as well for the learners as also for the educa-tors. Particularly in the e-Learning scenario, where learners rarely communicate upcoming conflicts, and where ongoing motivation needs to be understood as a crucial condition to succeed (Richter & Adelsberger, 2011a, p.1600), this issue needs to be targeted. In this paper, after introducing the relevant theoretical background, we first present our study setting and finally discuss the results.

Introduction

In our educational practice, we realized that the students’ different concepts of time and different perceptions on time-management, particularly in group-work scenarios, often led to conflicts between our students. Some students, particularly in group-work scenarios, felt pressured from the expectations of others, were disappointed when results from other group members came to late for further discussions, or simply did not deliver results in time because they understood given deadlines as recommendations instead of directives. However, we made similar experiences in both mono-cultural and cross-cultural learning scenarios and thus, were unsure if we were dealing with cultural dif-ferences or individually different attitudes.

Right now, we implement a dual-degree master program between our and a South Korean university. We plan to implement parts of the lectures in e-Learning scenarios in order to foster the development of cross-cultural Internet-based communication competences. In order to keep the motivation of our students on a high level, we would like to reduce upcoming conflict situations that are related to the differences between the two meeting cul-tures. As one aspect of our research on conflicts in cross-cultural e-Learning scenarios, we wanted to know if the concept of time is individually different or more general, a matter of culture. If culturally motivated, we thought be-ing able to circumvent such conflicts through preparation of students and supervisors. In this paper, we first investi-gate if the concept of time actually has cultural roots at all and then, we outline the state of the art regarding research on time management in the context of e-Learning. Afterwards, we introduce, present, and discuss the results of our survey, which we conducted in the Bulgarian, German, South Korean, Turkish and Ukrainian contexts.

The Concept of Time

According to Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner, who investigated culture in the context of organizations, ‘planning varies considerably between sequential and synchronic cultures’ (1998, p.139). While in sequentially thinking so-cieties, time is understood as a series of passing events and rather present and future are focused than the past, in synchronically thinking societies, present actions are understood being directly influenced (depending on the society in different levels) by the past and influencing the future (p.123). Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner found that the different cultural perspectives on the past, the present and the future have direct impact on the time management in terms of e. g., the planning horizon (pp.131-133), but also on the quality of human bonds (p.134). Although having revealed clear differences on national level in their investigations, no clear distinguishing between specific geo-graphic regions was possible (p.132-133).

Hall classifies the different perceptions of time into the categories monochronic (M-time) and policronic time (P-time) and reports that ‘when Americans interact with people of foreign cultures, the different time systems

cause great difficulty’ (1989, p.17). By his definition, M-time and P-time represent ‘two variant solutions to the use of time [and space, since space is interrelated with time] as organizing frames for activities’. While ‘M-time empha-sizes schedules, segmentation and promptness’, ‘P-time systems are characterized by several things happening at once’. According to Hall, in M-time systems, scheduling and time management are central aspects for the organiza-tion of life, and being in time is crucial for ones success: ‘For M-time people, … time is linear, can be wasted, lost, and run out, … and all important activities are scheduled’ (p.19). Different to that, polychronic people ‘are almost never alone’ (p.22), ‘interact with several people at once and are continually involved with each other’. In such con-texts, business happens always and everywhere. Thus, in P-time cultures, the involved persons and the finalization of task (whenever) are much more meaningful than exactly meeting a defined schedule (p.17). Coming back to Hall’s example of the Americans (who are M-time related), he argues that Americans, when being in overseas’ mar-kets ‘are psychologically stressed in many ways’, [because, e. g.,] ‘there is no order as to who is served next’ (p.19). Further, ‘appointments just do not carry the same weight as they do in the United States’, and ‘things are constantly shifted around. Nothing seems solid and firm, particularly plans for the future’ (p.18).

Analysing culture on a broad level, Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck (1961) found that ‘there are a limited num-ber of common human problems for which all peoples must at all times find some solution’ (p.10) and defined the “relationship with time” as one of their six “value-orientations”. They define such as ‘a generalized and organized principle concerning basic human problems, which pervasively and profoundly influence man’s behavior’ (p.341).

Hofstede and Hofstede (2005), building their dimensional model of culture on the value orientations of Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck, classified cultural value-systems within five bi-polar dimensions whereas the dimen-sions “individualism vs. collectivism” (IDV) and “long term vs. short term orientation” (LTO) appear to correlate (countries with a high level in IDV have a low level in LTO). The dimension IDV describes how far the ‘interest of the group prevails over the interest of the individual’ (p.74). The dimension LTO (p.207) describes the focus on fu-ture development: In short term-oriented societies, the past (tradition) and present are more focused than the future. Different to the results of Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner, Hofstede and Hofstede (2005, p.211) clearly express a regional tendency: People in Arab and Asian countries seem rather being short termed oriented, while people in Western societies are described to focus on the future development. In this context, there are further controversies between the statements/results of different researchers, such as, Hofstede’s national value for Great Britain ex-presses an extreme long-term orientation, while Hilmert (2002, p.682) states that ‘British enterprises act under con-ditions of high-profit orientation and a relatively short-time horizon’.

After having analyzed the literature, for our own research on learning culture and cross-cultural e-Learning scenarios, we took it for granted that the understanding of time and in particular time management actually are re-lated to culture. However, as well Trompenaars and Hampden Turner, as also Hall, and Hofstede and Hofstede un-derstand culture as a national phenomenon and thus, deduce related characteristics to all people belonging to a na-tion and to all contexts within the nation. Related to time-management, such an assumption would mean that if re-search within an enterprise shows that the management in this enterprise plans the business strategy with a strong focus on its future development, also university students in the same national context of the enterprise plan their ca-reers with future orientation and strictly follow this plan. At least the German reality appears different: While in the German business world everything is long-term planned and schedules are crucial to be met (Germans consider be-ing in time as a virtue), students seem to understand the educational context as an experimental phase of finding one’s path. Students rather choose subjects because they are interesting for them instead of providing good chances on the job-market. They even change their subject after already having passed half of the way if they realize that their study is different to what they imagined. From our experience in the German context, a systematically planned and successfully followed career-path from academic education to professional life rather is an exception than a rule.

In our own research within the context of Germany, we have found significant cultural differences between the contexts of professional and academic education (Richter & Adelsberger 2011b, p.144). The concept of a general national educational culture proved unrealistic. However, we found very similar answer-patterns within each of the academic sectors of South Korea and Germany (Richter & Adelsberger 2012). Thus, within the context of academic education, a generalization on national level seems appropriate, as long as a single national language is spoken.

Research on Time Management in e-Learning – State of the Art

Just little has been published on research on specific aspects of conflicts related to students’ perceptions of time and/or time-management in the context of e-Learning scenarios. Allen (2007) researched in the field of professional education in the UK. She found out that different “time-visions” (understanding of time) led to different approaches on time-management (p.557). Some of her monitored students had to ‘move out of their dominant cultural concept

of time and into dimensions from other time visions’, which appeared to them as a ‘disorienting process, similar to culture shock’ (p.570). Chabaya et al. (2009) conducted a survey in the context of Zimbabwe, investigating why re-search students at the Open University of Zimbabwe often fail to submit research projects in time. They found that the personal involvement/availability as well of the students as also of the instructors led to delays. Differing expec-tations from supervisors and students led to irritations. It seems that at least some of the students expected their su-pervisors to be permanently available for them and to immediately react on requests, which was not provided. After having addressed a concrete question to their supervisors, students stopped working until the question was fully an-swered (instead of going on working with another issue as the supervisors expected them to do). Also, when the stu-dents sent in draft versions of their work, they expected immediate review/feedback: ‘My tutor gives useful com-ments but takes her time to mark’ (p.218). The supervisors, on the other side, complained that the students did not continuously work but started short before it was too late: ‘These students play cat and mouse until it is late’ (p.217). Finally, the supervisors felt blamed: The students made them responsible for postponed deliveries of work because their reactions on requests did not happen on time: ‘The students do not honour deadlines but rush you as the deadline nears. I refuse’ (p.218). On a similar note, Lubega and Williams (2006) conducted their research in the academic context of UK and monitored the actions of 86 students within a course where in the end, a piece of work had to be delivered. They particularly investigated if chaired discussions between the students on the research/topic during the course’s runtime led to better results (in terms of delivering in time). They found that ‘discussing contrib-uted to the hand in of the course as majority of the students who discussed handed in on time‘ and that the ‘students who did not discuss were more likely to make late submission.’ (p.13). However, not discussing did not necessarily lead to late delivery, since 34% of their students did not discuss but deliver their work results in time. Those, Lubega and Williams described as ‘the ones who prefer to learn individually’ (p.13). ChanLin (2010) focused in her re-search on motivational issues regarding a web-based course in the Taiwanese context. She monitored students, while doing their work and in-between, asked them for their opinions on what they consider being motivating or disturb-ing. Regarding “time management” the students reported that ‘Knowing that we have plenty of time to learn in a Web-based class, we paid less attention to the specific learning time’ (p.95). In consequence, ‘Students complained of too much learning effort for preparing the course’ (p.96). However, they also reported that they ‘appreciated its [e-Learning] flexibility in learning time’ (p.97). Henderson and Putt (1999) investigated the value of audio conferencing in a cross-cultural context (indigenous Australian people and immigrants) and found that students find it helpful for the management of their scheduling having audio-conferences with the lecturers (p.29).

Designing the Questionnaire

The articles discussed in the last section, described issues on time-management in different cultural contexts in e-Learning based educational scenarios. They were related to individual preferences (audio conferencing for better time-management), to the general question why work-results are delivered too late (and how to improve the situa-tion), and on a very generic level, how students experience uncommon expectations on their own time-management. The described surveys were not designed to determine (culturally) common attitudes and took place within mono-cultural educational settings. For our own context, the question, why students deliver their work in time or too late was less demanding than how they think about their own time-management and deadlines. Least of our students are expected being familiar with collaborative activities in e-Learning scenarios and cross-cultural Internet-based com-munication. We were afraid that when colliding with other concepts of time-management, students from the partner universities might be frustrated and dropout instead of jointly working on a solution. Thus, we provided four state-ments for evaluation, which we thought are significant. Although we related the scenario with the context of group-work, we argue that the answers can be extrapolated to educational scenarios in general. Within a planned group-work, a time schedule regarding the finalization of the different subtasks has been deter-mined. How would you describe your personal time planning regarding your subtask?

1. I aim to finalize my work as soon as I have received the task. 2. I do my best to finalize my work on the point. 3. I only meet deadlines with great effort because I mostly start too late. 4. I often do not meet fixed deadlines.

In our full questionnaire, we targeted further topics (Richter 2011, p.6-7), such as the relationship to and expecta-tions on supervisors, motivation, feedback, group-work experiences/expectations in general, and gender-related top-ics. Some of those indirectly seem to be related to time management. However, we yet do not have enough data on different cultural contexts in order to validate such correlations.

The Study: Setting

We implemented the questionnaire in its’ online-form in three German universities and invited all students there for participation (mass mail). Finally in total, 1817 German students from three universities finalized the questionnaire. In the German sample, we focused on investigating differences between faculties (depth), which finally revealed be-ing relatively low. Thus, we needed a large number of sample-elements per university. The response rate in the German universities’ online survey was 2-5%. In the South Korean context, due to legal issues, we had to implement the questionnaire in its paper-form and did street-surveys. Here, the focus was related to differences between the universities (width) and thus, a larger number of universities was required. In total, we received 286 completed re-sponses from 39 universities. Also here, the general tendencies of answers were very similar. As for limiting the risk of subjectively chosen sample elements, we used a random route algorithm. In the Korean paper-based survey, al-most half of the invited students actually participated. We additionally implemented the questionnaire in Bulgaria, Turkey, and Ukraine. Different to the data of the German and the Korean survey, in Bulgaria, Turkey, and Ukraine, we addressed student associations and asked for support. Although the resulting sample-sizes were smaller (30-53), we are of the opinion that the data from those countries serve well to provide an idea on the possible spectrum of cultural differences. From our experiences in Germany and South Korea, we knew that at least in language-homogenous contexts, the spectrum of possible answers grows with a larger sample size but the answer-patterns themselves keep similar.

All questionnaires have been provided in each country’s official national language and translated by na-tional locals. The respondents were asked to evaluate the statements on a 4-point Likert scale. Additionally, they were able to express if a question does not apply the specific national context. This option was visually separated from the Likert-scale and thus, was not to be interpreted as a neutral position. In the Korean sample the ratio be-tween female (f) and male (m) students was almost equal. In the other samples, it was around (f) 1:2 (m).

Findings and Discussion of the Outcomes

In the following Table, we present the results of the survey per question and country. We binarized the results in positive and negative answers and calculated percentage values.

Bulgaria (n=30) Germany (n=1817) South Korea (n=286) Turkey (n=40) Ukraine (n=53) As soon as I have the task % positive answers 66.67 70.39 79.37 82.50 75.47 % negative answers 33.33 28.73 19.58 17.50 22.64 % of all female pos. 66.67 65.99 79.08 78.57 73.33 % of all female neg. 33.33 31.99 19.61 21.43 26.67

% of all male pos. 66.22 72.26 79.39 84.62 76.32 % of all male neg. 34.78 27.34 19.85 15.83 21.05

I do my best to finalize my work on the point % positive answers 73.33 78.59 79.72 82.50 64.15 % negative answers 26.67 20.58 18.88 17.50 28.30 % of all female pos. 66.67 75.55 76.47 78.57 53.33 % of all female neg. 33.33 23.16 21.57 21.43 33.33


Deadlines are difficult for me % positive answers 6.67 47.61 51.40 22.50 30.19 % negative answers 90.00 47.83 47.90 77.50 60.38 % of all female pos. 16.67 54.41 53.59 35.71 40.00 % of all female neg. 83.33 42.28 45.75 64.29 60.00


I often do not meet deadlines % positive answers 10.00 7.59 41.26 20.00 16.98 % negative answers 83.33 78.87 57.34 77.50 69.81 % of all female pos. 16.67 10.66 41.83 35.71 40.00 % of all female neg. 83.33 74.45 57.52 64.29 60.00


Table 1: Students’ perceptions on time management in Bulgaria, Germany, South Korea, Turkey and Ukraine

Instead of discussing the values from table 1, we first illustrate the positive answers per item and country in the fol-lowing figures 1 and 2. In the later following discussion, we focus on the German and the South Korean contexts.

Figure 1: Time Management in cross-cultural educational settings: Positive results per item and country in percent While the students’ evaluations of the first statement (Figure 1) vary between all contexts by just 15.83% and of the second, by 18.35%, the answer spectrum regarding the third (44.73%) and fourth (33,7%) statement is considerably wider. However, we found clear national tendencies in the answers. As for the third statement, the German and the Korean students’ answers are close to an equal distribution. This indicates that in those national contexts, the topic could be more related to the individuals than to the common rules within the context.

Figure 2: Time Management in cross-cultural educational settings: Visualization of differences Figure 2 illustrates the found differences between the national results in the student’s perceptions on time manage-ment: As more consistent the displayed shapes (per statement) appear, as smaller is the difference between answers in the national contexts. As already seen in Figure 1, the answers on the first and the second statements are close by and thus, led to relatively consistent shapes in Figure 2. Those statements are somehow related to the ideal situa-tions: The majority of participants like to start their work early and deliver it in time. The statements 3 and 4 focus on how the students evaluate their actual time-management. Related to the latter two statements, particularly be-tween Germany and South Korea major differences were found. While the students from both countries experience difficulties in being in time, the German students, however, manage to deliver their work in time (41.26% of the Ko-rean students do not). In Germany, if students do not deliver their work in time, the chance actually is gone and they lost a semester of work. Different to that, the Korean students appear getting a chance to postpone their delivery.

Conclusion

The survey revealed that there are general differences on the student’s perceptions of deadlines and time manage-ment. We, as educators, even regarding such a seemingly self-evident (for Germans) matter like delivering work in time, should not take for granted what we are used to in our own cultural context. If we want to avoid frustrations sides our international students because of different perceptions on and experiences with deadlines and time-management, we will need to clearly express what we expect them to do and which consequences the students may have to suffer, if such expectations are not met. We doubt being able to do more than providing clear information because as a matter of fairness, we cannot provide individually different deadlines for all of our students. In terms of group work, which was the initial topic, we should follow the approaches, suggested by Lubega and Williams (2006) and Henderson and Putt (1999) and provide chaired communication scenarios that support the students to continuously communicate and collaborate with each other. In this context, an introduction of possible cultural dif-ferences and a jointly (with the students) designed definition of common rules should also prove beneficial. Particu-larly in order to explain the found results but also to define limitations, further research is needed. At this point we would like to invite colleagues from all over the world to support our survey in their national/regional context.

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