The analysis and use of data generated by students' interactions with learning systems or programs--learning analytics--has recently gained widespread attention in the educational technology community. Part of the reason for this interest is based on the potential of learning analytic techniques such as data mining to find hidden patterns in…

There is a growing body of evidence that feeling present in virtual environments contributes to effective learning. Presence is a psychological state of the user; hence, it is generally agreed that individual differences in user characteristics can lead to different experiences of presence. Despite the fact that user characteristics can play a…

In the changing context of globalised higher education, a series of pedagogical shifts have occurred, and with them, a number of interactive learning approaches have emerged. This article reports on findings taken from a large-scale study that explored the socio-political impact of virtual world learning on higher education in the UK, specifically…

In this paper we argue that the use of audit trail data for research and evaluation purposes has attracted scepticism due to real and perceived difficulties associated with the data's interpretation. We suggest that educational technology researchers and evaluators need to better understand how audit trail data can be processed and analysed…