The study, conducted by Rasha Talib Ahmed Alnaqeeb and Nasuha Lee Abdullah of Universiti Sains Malaysia, tackles a critical gap in the technology adoption literature. Most previous research has focused on why people adopt a technology in the first place, treating continued use as an afterthought. Yet adoption and continuance are fundamentally different phenomena. A student may log into a learning management system once because a professor requires it, but whether that student returns week after week depends on a complex interplay of expectations, experiences, and capabilities. In Iraq, where only about 25 percent eLearning penetration persists and fewer than 35 percent of universities had solid eLearning frameworks after the pandemic, understanding this distinction is not academic hair-splitting but a matter of educational policy.

To model continuance intention, the researchers built an integrated framework combining two of the most influential theories in information systems research. The first is the Expectation-Confirmation Model, which explains post-adoption behavior through a simple psychological mechanism: users compare their actual experience with prior expectations, and the degree of confirmation shapes both satisfaction and the perceived usefulness of the system, which together drive the decision to continue. The second is UTAUT2, the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology, which contributes behavioral and motivational factors such as facilitating conditions, social influence, and hedonic motivation. Crucially, the team added a third ingredient rarely tested in this context: digital literacy, the student’s own technological competence, positioned as a capability factor that could be decisive in resource-constrained environments.

The methodology was rigorous and quantitative. Using a structured questionnaire administered to students in their second year of study or above across public universities in northern, central, and southern Iraq, selected through multi-stage sampling to ensure geographical representation, the researchers collected 332 valid responses, well above the minimum of 146 calculated with statistical power analysis. The data were analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling in SmartPLS 4, a technique well suited to prediction-oriented models with multiple latent constructs and mediation pathways. Measurement quality was confirmed through convergent validity, discriminant validity via the Fornell-Larcker criterion and the Heterotrait-Monotrait Ratio, and composite reliability scores all exceeding accepted thresholds.

The results paint a striking picture of what actually matters to students in this setting. Four factors significantly shaped satisfaction: facilitating conditions, hedonic motivation, digital literacy, and confirmation of expectations. Hedonic motivation, the sheer enjoyment of using the platform, emerged as the strongest driver, with a path coefficient of 0.316, suggesting that engaging and pleasurable design is not a luxury but a necessity. Confirmation, the sense that the system met expectations, strongly boosted perceived usefulness as well, with a coefficient of 0.469. Satisfaction itself explained a remarkable 61 percent of the variance in the model and, in turn, exerted the strongest direct influence on continuance intention, with a coefficient of 0.403.

Just as revealing were the factors that failed to register. Social influence, the encouragement of family, friends, and peers that features prominently in Western technology acceptance studies, had no significant effect on satisfaction. Perceived usefulness, the workhorse construct of the Technology Acceptance Model, also did not significantly influence satisfaction, contradicting the original Expectation-Confirmation Model. Yet perceived usefulness did have a significant direct effect on continuance intention, with a coefficient of 0.228. This dissociation suggests that Iraqi students may keep using eLearning because it helps them complete academic tasks, even when usefulness alone does not make them happy with the experience. Satisfaction, by contrast, appears to depend on broader experiential factors such as technical support, accessibility, enjoyment, and digital capability.

The mediation analysis sharpened these insights further. Satisfaction significantly mediated the pathways from facilitating conditions, hedonic motivation, digital literacy, and confirmation to continuance intention, meaning that infrastructure, enjoyment, competence, and met expectations all work through the emotional evaluation of the experience. But satisfaction did not mediate the effects of social influence or perceived usefulness. In other words, the social pressure of others neither improves the student’s experience nor translates into lasting engagement, while the instrumental value of the system operates on a separate, direct track. This pattern implies that established continuance theories may require contextual adaptation when applied in developing-country educational settings, where infrastructural instability reshapes the psychology of technology use.

The practical implications for universities and policymakers are concrete. Because facilitating conditions carry such weight, investment in reliable internet connectivity, hardware availability, and responsive technical support should be the first priority, particularly given that fragile infrastructure and system overload during exam periods frequently limit access in Iraq. Because hedonic motivation proved so powerful, institutions should develop interactive, gamified, and genuinely enjoyable course content rather than treating online platforms as mere repositories of lecture slides. Because digital literacy significantly predicted satisfaction, structured training programs for both students and lecturers are essential, especially in a country where uneven exposure to technology has left many users unfamiliar with effective platform use.

The study also carries a broader message for the global education technology community. Over 90 percent of higher education institutions in industrialized nations have adopted digital platforms such as Moodle, Google Classroom, and Microsoft Teams, yet the factors sustaining their use in wealthy, well-connected societies may not transfer cleanly to contexts where electricity stability and internet reliability cannot be taken for granted. The Iraqi case demonstrates that satisfaction-based retention models remain internationally applicable, but the specific levers that produce satisfaction differ. Where peers and perceived utility dominate in some settings, experiential and support-related factors dominate in others.

The authors acknowledge limitations, including the exclusion of first-year students and private universities, reliance on self-reported data, and a cross-sectional design that captures perceptions at a single point in time. Future research, they suggest, should explore the contextual reasons behind the non-significant effects of social influence and perceived usefulness, compare public and private institutions, and test whether digital literacy moderates the relationship between enjoyment and satisfaction. But the central finding stands firm: in resource-constrained higher education, the path to sustainable eLearning runs not through persuasion or promises of usefulness, but through building systems that are accessible, enjoyable, and matched to the real digital capabilities of the students who use them.

Subject of Research: Determinants of student continuance intention toward eLearning usage in Iraqi higher education institutions

Article Title: Determinants of continuance intention toward eLearning usage in higher education institutions

Article References: Alnaqeeb, R. T. A., & Abdullah, N. L. (2026). Determinants of continuance intention toward eLearning usage in higher education institutions. Discover Education, 5(1), Article 1165. https://doi.org/10.1007/s44217-026-02259-2

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1007/s44217-026-02259-2

Keywords: eLearning, continuance intention, higher education, digital literacy, student satisfaction, Expectation-Confirmation Model, UTAUT2, PLS-SEM, Iraq, educational technology, developing countries, technology adoption

Although the award is modest in dollar terms, it reflects a broader shift in how public agencies approach employee orientation. Traditional onboarding, in which new hires sit through days of in-person briefings, paperwork sessions, and policy walkthroughs, is expensive to deliver, difficult to standardize, and easy for overwhelmed newcomers to forget. Digital learning platforms promise a different model: training that new staff can complete at their own pace, revisit when needed, and that administrators can update centrally whenever policies or procedures change. The SUSTAIN eLearning platform, which is the focus of Smith’s funded work, is designed to serve exactly that purpose for county staff entering their roles.

The project will be carried out with support from the Center for Advancing Correctional Excellence, known as ACE!, a research center based at George Mason University. According to the announcement, ACE! will use the funding to provide support for SUSTAIN eLearning, including technical assistance with user accounts. That detail matters more than it might first appear. In large digital training deployments, account setup, access management, and troubleshooting are among the most common barriers that prevent new employees from actually completing their required modules. By building dedicated technical assistance into the project, the team is addressing a practical failure point that often undermines well-intentioned eLearning initiatives.

The connection between ACE! and a county onboarding program is grounded in the center’s specialty. ACE! focuses on advancing excellence in correctional settings, bringing research evidence to bear on how agencies that supervise, treat, and rehabilitate justice-involved individuals train their workforces and implement their programs. Correctional and related public-sector agencies face particularly acute onboarding pressures: staff turnover can be high, the work is demanding and safety-critical, and new employees must absorb a large volume of policy, procedure, and legal context in a short time. Structured, repeatable online training is one of the tools agencies use to make that knowledge transfer more reliable.

For Solano County, the fiscal-year designation in the project title signals that this is a continuing engagement rather than a one-off purchase. The FY27 label indicates that the county is funding the platform’s onboarding function for the 2026-2027 fiscal year, suggesting an ongoing relationship in which the eLearning system is treated as recurring infrastructure for workforce development rather than a single training event. Recurring funding models like this are common in public-sector software and training contracts, where agencies pay annually for platform access, content maintenance, and support services.

From a technical standpoint, eLearning onboarding platforms typically organize content into discrete modules that map to the topics a new hire must master: organizational policies, workplace conduct standards, safety procedures, role-specific duties, and administrative systems. Modern platforms track completion, quiz performance, and time spent on each section, giving supervisors and human resources staff a data trail showing exactly which parts of the onboarding curriculum each employee has finished. That data can flag where new staff struggle, informing revisions to the training content itself. While the announcement does not detail the specific architecture of SUSTAIN, the inclusion of account-level technical assistance implies a managed platform with individual user logins rather than a static library of documents.

The pedagogical rationale for moving onboarding online rests on well-established findings from learning research. Spaced repetition, self-paced progression, and the ability to revisit material after the initial orientation period all improve retention compared with single-session, in-person instruction. New employees also differ widely in their prior experience and learning speed, and a fixed classroom schedule forces everyone through the same material at the same rate. Self-directed modules let experienced hires move quickly through familiar content while newcomers spend more time on unfamiliar ground. For agencies, the approach also reduces the burden on senior staff, who would otherwise spend working hours delivering the same orientation presentations to each incoming cohort.

Smith’s role as a Research Associate at the Schar School places the project within a policy-oriented academic environment rather than a commercial training vendor. University-based research centers frequently contract with state and local governments to design, deliver, and evaluate training and technical assistance programs, drawing on faculty expertise in public administration, organizational behavior, and implementation science. The Schar School, located in the Washington, D.C. area, specializes in policy and government research, and projects like this one translate that expertise into practical tools for public agencies. The award also illustrates how relatively small contracts, in this case under five thousand dollars, can fund targeted, high-value services such as platform support and account assistance that keep a larger training system running.

The funding announcement itself is a grant and award notice distributed through EurekAlert!, the science communication service operated by AAAS, and issued by George Mason University. Such announcements serve an accountability function, documenting how public and institutional research funds are allocated and giving outside observers a window into the applied work that universities perform for government clients. In this case, the notice specifies the funder, the amount, the project title, the funding period, and the role of ACE! in providing platform support, a level of detail that allows the project to be tracked as part of the university’s broader portfolio of public-sector engagement.

As the funding period unfolds through June 2027, the practical test for the SUSTAIN onboarding project will be whether new Solano County staff complete their training smoothly and retain what they learn. The elements in place, a structured eLearning platform, recurring fiscal-year funding, and dedicated technical assistance from a university research center specializing in correctional excellence, are the ingredients that workforce development researchers generally associate with successful digital onboarding. If the model performs well, it offers a template other counties could follow: modest, targeted investments in online training infrastructure and support, backed by academic expertise, to make the first weeks of a public-sector job less chaotic and more effective for the people navigating them.

Subject of Research: Funded development of an online onboarding eLearning platform for new county staff

Article Title: Smith receives funding for online onboarding training for new staff SUSTAIN Training – An eLearning Platform FY27

Article References: Smith receives funding for online onboarding training for new staff SUSTAIN Training – An eLearning Platform FY27. (n.d.). Original publication

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: Not provided

Keywords: eLearning, onboarding training, George Mason University, Schar School, Solano County, workforce development, correctional excellence, public administration, technical assistance, grant funding, digital training, new staff orientation

A team of researchers at University Hospital Magdeburg, led by Franka Stolze and colleagues including Manuel Lehm, Daniel Behme, Erelle Fuchs, and Roland Schwab, set out to answer exactly that. In an exploratory study published in BMC Medical Education, they compared two standardized, self-directed instructional formats for teaching basic neuroangiographic skills: video-based instruction and presentation-based instruction. The work arrives at a moment when simulation-based learning and digital teaching tools are playing an increasingly prominent role in medical curricula, and when earlier studies have already suggested that video and even virtual reality can be just as effective as traditional presentation-based teaching for clinical skills. What makes this study distinctive is its focus on a highly technical, procedurally complex skill that has rarely been examined through this lens.

The experimental design was elegantly simple. Twenty participants with varying levels of prior angiography experience were randomly assigned to one of two groups. Nine participants formed the video-based group, while eleven formed the presentation-based group. Those in the video group watched expert-narrated recordings of a physician performing neuroangiography on a silicone flow model, a physical simulator that mimics the vascular anatomy and hemodynamics of the human circulation. Those in the presentation group independently worked through static, simplified slides derived from the same instructional material, consisting of schematic illustrations accompanied by brief written annotations. The content was matched, meaning both groups received the same underlying information; only the format of delivery differed. This careful matching is what allows the study to isolate the effect of the medium itself rather than the content being taught.

After completing their assigned instruction, all twenty participants faced the same test: performing neuroangiography on the silicone flow model using three different catheter types, the Vertebralis, the Simmons 2, and the Headhunter. Each of these catheters has a distinct shape and handling profile, and each demands different manipulation strategies to reach the target vessels. The researchers assessed overall performance using objective criteria, including total procedure time and fluoroscopy time, the latter being a particularly meaningful measure because it reflects how much X-ray exposure a trainee would generate in a real procedure. In addition to these objective measures, participants provided self-reported data on their learning experience and confidence levels, giving the researchers both a behavioral and a subjective picture of how each format performed.

The results revealed a fascinating and somewhat counterintuitive pattern. For the Vertebralis catheter, participants in the presentation-based group actually used significantly less fluoroscopy time than their video-trained counterparts. On average, the presentation group needed 237 seconds of fluoroscopy, while the video group required 369 seconds, a difference that reached statistical significance with a p-value of 0.031. In practical terms, the slide learners were faster and more economical with X-ray use when tackling their first catheter task. This finding challenges the widespread assumption that video, with its dynamic depiction of real-time catheter movement, must necessarily translate into better procedural efficiency.

Yet the story does not end there, and the subjective data tells a very different tale. Despite their longer fluoroscopy times, participants rated the video method as significantly more helpful overall, with a p-value of 0.022. This disconnect between objective performance and subjective preference is one of the most intriguing aspects of the study. It suggests that the perceived value of watching an expert’s hands move in real time, hearing the narration of decision-making as it unfolds, may create a sense of understanding and preparedness that static slides cannot match, even when the measurable outcomes do not always align with that feeling.

Perhaps the most clinically important finding emerged when the researchers examined how prior experience shaped the results. Among participants who were inexperienced in angiography, video-based training led to more successful catheterization of the left vertebral artery, with a p-value of 0.048, and fewer path deviations, also with a p-value of 0.048, compared to the presentation-based approach. In other words, for true beginners, watching the video appeared to confer genuine procedural advantages: they were more likely to actually reach the target vessel and more likely to keep their catheter on the intended route through the vascular tree. Path deviations matter enormously in real angiography, because a catheter straying from the intended path can risk vessel spasm, dissection, or other complications in living patients.

This experience-dependent effect has real implications for how training programs might be structured. The study suggests that video-based instruction may be particularly valuable as an adjunct to early neuroangiography training, precisely at the stage where novices are building their first mental models of catheter behavior and vascular anatomy. For beginners, the dynamic, narrated demonstration may provide crucial cues about hand movements, catheter shaping, and navigation strategy that static schematics struggle to convey. More experienced learners, by contrast, may already possess enough procedural schema to extract what they need from simplified diagrams, and may even benefit from the cognitive economy of slides, which strip away the visual complexity of a live procedure and highlight only the essential steps.

The authors are careful to frame their conclusions appropriately. This was an exploratory study with a modest sample size of twenty participants, and the groups were uneven, with nine in the video arm and eleven in the presentation arm. The findings should therefore be seen as hypothesis-generating rather than definitive. Nonetheless, the researchers conclude that video-based instruction may be a valuable adjunct to early neuroangiography training, especially for beginners, and they highlight the potential benefits of integrating video-based elements into a blended learning curriculum for neuroangiography. At the same time, they note that further optimization of instructional design is needed in medical education, acknowledging that neither format is a finished solution and that the ideal combination of media remains to be determined.

Beyond its immediate findings, the study speaks to a broader transformation underway in medical training. As access to patients for hands-on learning becomes more constrained and as simulation technology grows more sophisticated, educators must make deliberate, evidence-based choices about which digital formats to invest in. This study offers a nuanced answer: the best format may depend on who is learning. Videos appear to give novices a genuine edge in mastering the fundamental maneuvers of catheter navigation, while presentations may offer efficiency advantages in certain objective measures. The future of procedural training, the work suggests, lies not in picking a single winner but in thoughtfully blending formats, using dynamic video demonstrations to build foundational intuition in beginners and complementing them with structured, simplified materials as skills mature. For the next generation of neuroradiologists, how they learn their first catheter navigation may be just as important as who teaches them.

Subject of Research: Comparing video-based and presentation-based self-directed instruction for learning basic neuroangiography skills

Article Title: Comparison of video-based and presentation-based self-directed instruction for learning basic neuroangiography

Article References: Stolze, F., Lehm, M., Behme, D., Fuchs, E., & Schwab, R. (2026). Comparison of video-based and presentation-based self-directed instruction for learning basic neuroangiography. BMC Medical Education, 26(1), Article 1572. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-026-10418-0

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1186/s12909-026-10418-0

Keywords: neuroangiography, medical education, video-based learning, simulation training, fluoroscopy, catheter navigation, self-directed instruction, neuroradiology, blended learning, surgical training, eLearning, Comparison