Multimiedia in the Accounting Classroom: The Impacts of Faculty Rank and Teaching/Research Missions on Its Utilization
RaymondLandry, Jr., Thomas Case, William Francisco
Multimedia instruction is becoming more prevalent in university classrooms. Research spurred by learning models and instructional design frameworks suggests that multimedia use in the classroom can enhance student learning by providing educators with a variety ofmeansfor communicating both theory andproblem solving. Many educators, however,continue to usetraditional instructional technologies ratherthan embracingmultimedia-orientedapproaches andfew investigators have examined why.
This study addressed the impacts offaculty rank and university mission (teaching vs. research) on self-reported use and intentions-to-use multimedia instructional approaches in the classroom via responses to a survey distributed to randomly selected accounting educators. Across ranks, accounting instructors generally have positive impressions of multimedia and its potential to enhance student learning; most respondents indicate intentions to further incorporate it into their classes. Despite such positive impressions and intentions, current utilization ofmultimedia in the accounting classroom was reportedto lagfar behindthe use oftraditionalinstructional approaches. Accounting faculty members at research-mission universities were found to have greater reservations about the instructional benefits ofmultimedia and were more likely to report that they had no intentions to use multimedia in the future. In general, the findings suggest that university mission has a stronger influence than academic rank on faculty perceptions and utilization ofmultimedia.
The findings also suggest that regardless ofrank and university mission, lack ofaccess to appropriate hardware and software, limited time to develop multimedia courseware, and insufficient training opportunities are major deterrents to more widespread use ofmultimedia among accounting educators. Limited experience with presentation software and limited knowledge about how to incorporate it in the classroom also deters wider use ofmultimedia. Investment in appropriate information technology andfaculty training and development opportunities appear to be important administrative actions that could lead to greater use ofmultimedia amongfaculty members. The results also suggest thatfaculty adoption ofother emerging instructional technologies, including web-based instruction, may be impacted by similar deterrents and administrative responses.
RaymondLandry, Jr. is an associate professor at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Arkansas. His teaching areas are accounting information systems and computer auditing. Hiscurrent research interests includethe use of technology in education and business, and the behavioral issues involving the use of computers. His research has been published in Review of Accounting Information Systems, Journal ofAccountingand Computers, Management Accounting, Expert Systems Planning, Implementation and Integration, and The EDP Auditor Journal, and national and international proceedings.
Thomas Case is a professor of information systems at the College of Business Administration, Georgia Southern University, where he teaches both graduate and undergraduate courses in business telecommunications, network administration, and IT management. His research interests include the curricular implications of information age organization structures andtransorganizational systems development and management. He is the author of more than forty articles and two textbooks. Dr. Case has served the IS discipline through a number of offices in both IAIM and the Southern Association ofInformation Systems.
William Francisco CPAlCMA, is an associate professor at Georgia Southern University in Statesboro, Georgia. He received his Masters of Accounting from the University of Southern Mississippi. His teaching interests are in the area of Managerial Accounting. His current research interest involves the use of technology in the classroom. His research has been published in Production and Inventory ManagementJournal, New Accountant, Communicator, and Business Education Forum, and other regional and national proceedings.
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