A study by the researchers at Illinois university has found the impact of pandemic changes on indian college students regarding their motivation and interests. The study explains about the variation among a group of students on the basis of their ability for adopting to new conditions of educations.
The university conducted the study last year when the pandemic situations became worst and made the colleges to be shut for several months. During this period, concerns arose that many students may lose motivation towards studies may drop out of the colleges at a large number.
For gathering supportive evidences to this theoretical study, the university conducted an experiment on 182 undergraduate students of a biology course. The results showed that few students demotivated, few were more motivated while some had no changes in interests.
The volunteer of this experiments were students of a course which is conventionally taught in classrooms but was shifted to online mode once half course is completed. This made students to move back to homes and study virtually which exposed them to sudden change in situations.
Analysing the results of this experiment, the author of this study concluded that a large group of students lack flexibility for the change in conditions. As this is the first generation experiencing such changes, it is quiet difficult for them to adopt quickly.
Students who participated in the experiment were surveyed repeatedly every month during the period of experiment. The students were presented with questionnaires which examined various factors related to motivation, interest and engagement in studies or any other related activity.
On the analysis of this questionnaires the study found out that with the advancement of course after students are shifted to online studies, the motivation in students gradually decreased which made more students to drop out till the end of semester.
The study also considered the affect of several other conditions on students like family dynamics, mental stress, exam pressure and other factors. Most of the students were found to lack financial sources to continue their studies especially the ones who have lost their parents.