Research in distance education - past, present and future

Research in distance education - past, present and future (1994)

Torstein Rekkedal, Director of research and development, NKI, Norway

Introduction

Developments in any field are results of interaction between practice, research and external influences. This chapter is written on the belief that the most powerful force for development in distance education comes from the synergetic effect of interrelating research and practice. We should strive at reaching a situation where a large deal of the research in the field were related to practice and where practitioners both had the basic knowledge to understand the reports and results from research and the willingness to examine the research literature and reflect on what research results can tell before taking decisions and acting. Further, practitioners should be involved in research and evaluation themselves, either as participants in projects led by professional researchers or by initiating their own projects in their own environment.

Thorpe (1988) argues for practitioner based evaluation as the basis for developing quality and improving learning in distance education. Rekkedal (1993a) give similar arguments with reference to experiences from practical related research in one specific institution.

This contribution aims at presenting some focal issues of distance education research. It is written primarily for practitioners who wish to become acquainted with the field of distance education research and its present status. As we will see, the task of selecting the most important issues for an introduction to the field of research and evaluation in distance education is quite difficult. In selecting some of the issues from the research agenda, we have tired to refer to literature which has some fundamental value for understanding the present status of distance education research, which represent some basic works in the field, or which give an overview or introduction to existing theory and research on different aspects of distance education.

Research in distance education - what is it?

It would not be easy to get researchers agree on a definition of what research is. We would try with one put forward by Kerlinger (1969, p. 13):

"Scientific research is systematic, controlled, empirical, and critical investigation of hypothetical propositions about the presumed relations among natural phenomena" (1969, p. 13).

I our view, a research project does not necessarily satisfy all these criteria. For instance, a systematic search of literature might in itself constitute a research project. However, any activity to be classified as research must apply certain recognised scientific methods and techniques. We would also open the definition to include evaluation and evaluation research.

According to Thorpe (ibid. page 5):

"Evaluation is the collection, analysis and interpretation of information about any aspect of a programme of education and training, as part of a recognised process of judging its effectiveness, its efficiency and any other outcomes it may have".

Evaluating courses and programmes is an important activity of any distance teaching institution/department. We would include such actitivities in the research concept as "evaluation research" if they are explicitly using scientific methods and techniques (Schuemer 1991).

Distance education research - a developing field

Research in distance education has a relatively short tradition. In the 70‘s it was quite common that reports from distance education research projects started with a regret of the lack of prior theory or empirical research data on the problem or relevant for the problem in question.

When the chair of the research committee of the ICCE, G. B. Childs (1969) presented his international survey of research in distance education to the 8th International Conference in 1969, his presentation was the only one related to research, and there were so few reported internationally that he could give at least some information from every one of them.

We believe that today it is more correct to say that distance educators generally have been more engaged in theoretical and practical research related to their own field than their counterparts in the traditional mainstream of education. There are many reasons for this situation (and these are also the main reasons for trying to stimulate future research with high quality):

• Active interest in questions of learning, media and communication has been necessary to serve students in a non-traditional setting. This need will only increase as new media and technologies are continuously introduced.
• Distance education gives less opportunity for direct feedback from students, thus, it has been necessary to develop formal procedures for programme evaluation. In the future it would be desirable that also individual evaluation projects were carried out with reference to research and evaluation carried out in other settings and report result in ways to give maximum transfer and development effects to the field in general.
• Distance education is often characterised by a division of labour between many different "experts" and professions. Explicit insight in the processes becomes more important for system organisation, administration and changes for increased quality.
• Distance education is often initiated on the basis of political aims and goals for the society and/or the needs of specific groups. Evaluation of the results then becomes important and will often be required by official bodies. External demands on policy, effects and cost-efficiency is only increasing due to world wide pressure on economy.
• Distance education is still in many situations an innovative activity, working with new organisational models, alternative teaching strategies, new media and technology. Valid and reliable information about effectiveness is strongly needed.
• Distance education (both private and public) has had a need to develop and demonstrate quality, because it often has been considered by the traditional academic community to be some kind of only second rate education.

At the world conference in Oslo in 1988 research was a focal theme, and there were 40 papers categorised as research. Many other presentations also represented research work (see Sewart & Daniel 1988). We have made a similar survey of the contributions (book of abstracts) to the 16th ICDE conference in Bangkok 1992 (Scriven 1992) and found 35 papers under the theme, research, and that 141 of 342 papers totally were in some way concerned with formal evaluation, theoretical work on different aspects of distance education or reported ongoing or completed empirical research projects.

The British Open University has perhaps been the largest source of inspiration for the growth and development of distance education research. From its beginning The Open University has had a specific department responsible for research and evaluation, the Institute of Educational Technology. Later, similar institutions established around the world have also normally organised separate units responsible for research and evaluation activities. Some of these research units have published series of reports which represent valuable sources of information. Appendix 1 gives an overview of some of these report series as well as the major international journals, ICCE/ICDE Conference Proceedings and some international bibliographies.

Some notes on quality, theory and methodology

A number of general reviews of the research in distance in distance education have been carried out during the last few years (see, for instance Moore 1985, Calvert 1986, 1988, 1990, Cookson 1989, Holmberg 1990, Bates 1993, Rekkedal 1993b). One can easily agree that the quantity of reported works is enormous. However, some reviewers question whether the quality of the research in distance education is generally acceptable.

Moore (1985) argues that most of the research published is descriptive and not generalisable, that it is only marginally based in theory, that researchers seem not to take time to consult and refer to previous research, and he specifically regrets that experimental research under controlled conditions is practically non-existent. Calvert (1988) seems to agree with most of Moore‘s observations. She mentions as a problem that most of the research in distance education has been carried out by academics with little knowledge of pedagogical theory and without training in social science research methodology and design. Further, these practitioner researchers often have jobs where their research roles compete unfavourably with competing administrative demands (Calvert 1990). Moore (ibid.) comments that we have moved very slowly forward just because researchers neglect previous research and careful design of their projects. We would add that Moore‘s observation on the neglect of reviewing relevant research is a large problem, especially as new people continuously enter the distance education field. It is a danger of wasting time and money with little progress in understanding if new research projects do not build on what already has been done.

With reference to the above considerations one can understand that some distance education researchers complain that their contributions receive little attention and that discussion is lacking. While new theories and methods in other educational settings creates international debate and discussion, which is the necessary basis for development of an academic field, distance education researchers have experienced that their contributions have been met by absolute silence (Coldeway 1988).

On the other hand, there is no doubt that we are moving forward concerning research quality. Certainly, a progress in developing a body of theory of distance learning has taken place. We will come back to this later. There are also many examples on research projects reported today that shows that we are on the way of building up a group of academics world wide having qualified for their academic degrees from research in distance education, and who apply rigorous methods on researching distance learning questions with a firm base in theory and previous research. In a recent survey of research Bates (1993) specifically notes that a review of the major journals on distance education the last few years shows lot of high quality research has been reported since 1988.

We agree with Moore (1985, 41) when he claims that distance education as an applied professional field "... needs two kinds of research. Obviously it needs research which helps to solve problems, but it also needs basic research - that is, research which tests and extends basic knowledge which is helpful to us all - and that is the theory." Moore suggests the approach of "grounded theory" (Glaser & Strauss 1967), where theory can be inductively generated by systematic analysis of empirical data. Grounded theory assumes that the purpose of theory is to promote understanding, and that understanding can only be achieved through the researcher‘s immersion in data experienced in context. The resulting theory is thereby "grounded" in data. Rather than beginning with theory in the positivistic sense and deriving hypotheses from the theory and testing them, grounded theorists begin with a phenomenon or set of data. Similar viewpoints are put forward by Holmberg (1986a). As we understand Holmberg, we find that he argues for the value of research aiming at solving practical problems as well as research based in theory. I one of his latest writings he also refer to grounded theory as an interesting approach. He also suggests that theories for distance education developed this way could be tested by deductive methods. "The theories would then be both grounded in and tested by data." Holmberg (1991, p. 28).

Before leaving this discussion on research quality, design and methods, we should point out that some of the criticism is clearly based on different philosophies and views on research methodology. We have seen a shift from research mainly based on quantitative methods in the 60‘s and beginning of the 70‘s to qualitative research influenced in the 70‘s and 80‘s. There is no doubt that research methods developed in the qualitative tradition have had positive effects on the research agenda and on what types of questions that have been examined. Morgan (1984) has given an excellent general overview of qualitative methods for research in distance education, and Minnis (1985) has described how qualitative methodologies such as ethnography, case study and grounded theory can be applied to expand the research base in our field. A recent article by Burge (1992) gives arguments for qualitative research and combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods with examples of problem areas, reported projects and research methodology.

The research agenda - past and present

Defining distance education as a field of study

As a relatively new field of study, it has been important for distance education to define itself and build up a theory base for its research. Without this theory base and agreement on what it is all about, it difficult to achieve progress in the field. Keegan (1991) has pointed out that the study of distance education has developed in four stages.

Stage 1. The study of terminology. Until 1978 there was large confusion in the use of terminology. According to Keegan (Ibid. 38) "Little progress in this field of study was possible while confusion reigned over the field being studied." By 1978 a general agreement was reached that "distance education" became the general term for the field.

Stage 2. The study of definition. Up to 1980 there was confusion about what distance education really was. "Progress in the study of distance education was greatly hampered by the confusion over definition." Keegan (ibid. 38).

According to Keegan, this was to a large extent solved in the early 80‘s. The following descriptive definition of distance education seems to be generally recognised:

Distance education is a form of education characterised by:

• the quasi-permanent separation of teacher and learner throughout the length of the learning process
• the influence of an educational organisation
• the use of technical media
• the provision of two way communication
• the quasi-permanent absence of the learning group throughout the length of the learning process (Keegan 1990, 44).

I an earlier edition Keegan (1986, 49-50) added: "...there are two socio-cultural determinants which are both necessary pre-conditions and necessary consequences of distance education. These are: the presence of more industrialised features than in conventional oral education and the privatisation of institutional learning."

One should note that some disagreement has been put forward. One example is Garrison (1989) who has strongly opposed the last criterion of Keegan‘s definition and his addition on industrialisation of teaching the privatisation of learning. Garrison points out that with new communication technologies the boundaries between distance education and traditional education will become increasingly blurred, and that learning in groups will become quite usual in modern distance teaching applying tele communication media.

Stage 3. Nature of the field of study. In 1990 progress had been achieved on the nature of the field of study called "distance education".

Holmberg (1986b, 1989, 1995) has argued that distance education research has established itself as a specific scientific discipline, which can be described both in terms of a recognised basis of theory, its research programmes and in terms of a curriculum for university study. According to Holmberg (1986b) a structure of a discipline is emerging with the following content areas:

• Philosophy and theory
• Distance students, their milieu, conditions and motivation
• Subject-matter presentation
• Communication and interaction between students and their supporting organisation (tutors, counsellors, administrators, other students)
• Administration and organisation
• Economics
• Systems (comparative distance education, typologies, evaluation etc.)
• History of distance education

Other researchers reject that distance education in fact is a separate discipline, and secondly doubt whether distance education as a field of academic study will benefit from being separated from other fields of educational research (Shale 1988, Devlin 1989, Garrison 1989).

In our view distance education is not and should not be seen as a separate academic discipline, but as a field of research belonging to the faculties of education. At present there are faculties of education offering courses on practice, theory and methods of distance education, research centres on distance education at some universities, and there are specific professional programmes on distance education, such as the Masters Degree from University of South Australia and Deakin Universities.

Stage 4. Focus of the field of study. The focus of the field of study is concerned with all aspects of the fact that this form of education has abandoned face-to-face communication and replaced it by media based communication at a distance. This fact creates a distinct set of problems essential for the existence of distance education as a separate academic field of study within education (Keegan 1991, 40).

Teaching philosophy and the development of theories of distance education

Concerning the development of theory for distance education, some few researchers have been given a central position in the international debate.

Moore (1977) has developed a theory structure for distance education, "a theory of independent study". He analyses distance education on two dimensions, "distance" and "student autonomy". Although distance in most situations means physical separation of student and teacher, in Moore‘s terminology distance is to be understood psychologically as an effect of the interaction between two aspects of the teaching medium, dialogue and structure. According to Moore, learner responsibility is evident in independent adult study. Thus, the teaching institution should give the student the most possible freedom, independence and autonomy in the studies. The two dimensions, distance and autonomy are used both for describing and analysing distance learning programmes and for planning and teaching for adult learners.

Delling (1987) has put forward similar ideas. He is generally sceptical to theories based on "teaching and teachers" instead of theories based on "learning and learner‘s needs". The teaching organisation is seen as a "helping organisation" for independent learners.

Peters (1983) has analysed distance education as "an industrialised form of teaching". According to Peters, human life has been generally influenced be the technological developments of industrialisation - except traditional forms of education. In this view distance education represents the industrialised form of teaching. The following aspects are typical for an industrial process:

• Rationalisation
• Division of labour
• Mechanisation
• Assembly line
• Mass production
• Planning and preparation
• Standardisation

It should be noted that Peters does not put forward any value statements whether industrialisation of teaching is good or bad, but presents a theory for analysing large scale distance education systems.

Holmberg (see for instance 1989) has developed a theory for distance teaching based on a concept of distance teaching as "guided didactic conversation". The didactic conversation takes place at two levels, simulated through the pre produced learning material and through the real two way communication taking place during the learning process. Holmberg supplies examples on hypotheses derived from the theory. He also gives examples on research projects and results supporting the theory.

A couple of other works concerning theory research deserve also to be mentioned. One is Bååth‘s analysis of distance teaching based on 7 different teaching models, namely:

• Skinner‘s behaviour-control model
• Rothkopf‘s model for written instruction
• Ausubel‘s advance organiser model
• Egan‘s model of structural communication
• Bruner‘s discovery-learning model
• Roger‘s model for facilitation of learning
• Gagné‘s general teaching model

According to Bååth (1979), all these models are applicable to distance teaching, some of them perhaps more easily than others. The models studied put demands on distance learning systems which should inspire new developments for the future.

We would also like to mention the REDEAL project at Athabasca University. This project is in some ways outstanding in that a group of researchers over time has carried out a number of different projects based on a systematic application of behavioural psychology theory, behaviour analysis and a specific paradigm for teaching, The Personalised System of Instruction (PSI) The research covered different aspects of distance education, such as tutor training and tutor communication skills, use of seminars, face-to-face teaching and group based learning, personal progression schedules and interactions between learner characteristics and a number of teaching-learning variables (Coldeway 1982).

The theories and models presented above are generally based on a concept of distance education as generically different from traditional education. Garrison (1989) argues that these theories are not suitable as a "framework for the future", as new technologies make distance education more similar to traditional education. Thus, the theories of distance education based on the assumption of students individual learning from pre produced learning material and through a relatively restricted interaction between an individual student and one tutor has to be replaced by theories closer to traditional education. According to this view, a "paradigm shift" in practical approaches to distance teaching and learning is taking place. The new systems based on a wide application of tele-communication technology gives quite new possibilities for intensive communication between students and teachers and new possibilities for group based learning. The theories for teaching and learning in distance education must take account of this fact. Theories developed for systems based on correspondence education and mass media technology is no longer sufficient.

Garrison‘s book is one example that theoretical views, in fact, may cause some international debate (see ICDE Bulletin 22, 24, 26). (For an overview of theories and models for distance education see also Henri & Kaye (1985).)

Surveys and description of student bodies, recruitment, drop out and completion

A number of descriptive studies and statistics on distance education, recruitment, drop out and student characteristics have been published during the last 25 years. As governments around the world often establish distance education with the political intention of catering for specific needs and target groups, they will often also sponsor different kind of survey research to see whether the goals are met. Many of the reports in this area would scarcely be regarded as research in a strict sense. In our opinion, this kind of research is clearly justified because there has been a need for demonstrating to politicians, governments and to the public the importance of the contributions from distance education. When distance education is introduced to new countries, and when it is spreading to new areas of education and training, there will be a demand for such survey studies.

However, we would argue that researchers conducting this type of research also should take the time and effort to look into what is done elsewhere, so that the questions examined and the research procedures build on previous research. This will secure a more consistent body of knowledge and experiences to be built up, and also that statistics, experiences and results may have larger transfer value.

One of the early large surveys was Glatter & Wedell‘s (1971) study of recruitment to distance education institutions in Britain. A follow up study was carried out after 4 years (Harris 1972). Most distance teaching universities have published research on recruitment and drop out. Examples are the reports from the research group on recruitment and completions at the British Open University (see for instance McIntosh et al. 1980, Woodley 1988) and the German FernUniversität (Bartels 1989).

Research on women and gender questions also have received some attention the last few years. In the broad context this research addresses a lot of different questions (Prümmer et al. 1988, Prümmer 1993, Burge & Lenskyi 1990). However, much of this research examine questions concerning student profiles, needs, recruitment and drop out among female students. Examples are the research report series "Women in distance Education" from the FernUniversität and a joint research project on the needs of women in distance education co-operatively carried out by the FernUniversität and the British Open University (Kirkup & Prümmer 1990).

Over time some comparative surveys on distance education and traditional education have been reported. We would argue that it does not have much worth to try to justify distance education through comparative research, by examining results etc. between students in distance education and traditional education. By examining the literature on distance education, one will find that distance education does work. Comparisons of student success in different systems are generally of little value because the students are different and because they live and study under different conditions. The relative quality of distance education to other forms of education, in our view, belong to the realm of methaphysics rather than science.

In this connection it might also be discussed whether drop out research is of much value. Some used the same arguments against comparative research on research on drop and stated that research on drop out may be harmful just because it drives the attention towards drop out and in some ways may indicate that drop out is a problem specifically related to distance education. In our opinion, questions related to completions of studies are important in all forms of education, and perhaps specifically in part time studies. This does not imply that comparisons of drop out frequencies etc. between different types of systems, especially not between full time students in ordinary schools and universities and part time adult students, give much useful information to anyone. The point is that distance education in many ways represents an innovation under continuous development. Thus, statistics related to cost-efficiency, student success and completion most probably will have a central position also in the future, especially as measures on dependent variables in systematic research aiming at developing the quality of distance teaching.

Researchers have been looking for fruitful models or paradigms for analysing drop out and completions in distance education. Bernard & Amundsen (1989) have conducted a study to test Tinto‘s (1975) model of drop out from higher education and concluded that in distance study different course related factors may exert a relatively more potent influence relative to the major elements of academic and social integration in Tinto‘s model. Another example of theory work on drop out is Bajtelsmit‘s (1988) discussion of the relevance of Tinto‘s model for explaining drop out from distance study and his proposal of another model putting more emphasis on external factors, such as job and family commitments, and student support measures, as more relevant for distance education (see also Peters (1992) who discusses possible research procedures on drop out at the FernUniversität based on Bajtelsmit‘s model and referring to models of student support (Sewart 1978, Rekkedal 1985)).

Media and technology

The literature on distance education still generally forecasts that print based text media will be the most important technology for presenting the content of learning also in the foreseeable future. Some research has been carried out on printed study material and learning from text. The British Open University has, for instance, a long tradition of research into the development of text based learning materials and how students learn from texts. This research covers a number of research studies on the use of behavioural objectives, graphics, language and typography, activities in self-instructional texts and deep and surface level approaches to learning (see for instance Lockwood 1992, Morgan 1993, Gibbs et al. 1982). The studies indicate that students approach their learning in quite different ways, and that the course developers‘ assumptions not necessarily corresponds with the students‘ ways of using the material. Students also find "time efficient methods for study" which means that they often do not take advantage of the activities built into the texts. Similar results have been reported by Marland et al. (1990). An empirical study by Parer (1988) has shown that textual design does influence student learning, and as experimental studies have been asked for, we should mention a recent experimental study by Naidu and Bernard (1992) examining the effect of different teaching strategies, concept mapping and in text questions.

One cannot discuss research on learning from texts without pointing to the really influential works on different ways students approach their learning conducted by a group of researchers at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden (Marton & Säljö 1976; Marton 1979). They found that some students seem to regard the texts as the object of the learning process and memorising the text as the aim of learning, while others focus their attention on something beyond the text, and regard the text only as a means of finding out something about the phenomena treated. The researchers describe the individual student‘s way of conceiving the relationship between the text itself and the subject of the text as two different ways of approaching the learning task. They have describes these two different ways of approaching learning as surface level and deep level approaches, also called an atomistic or holistic way of understanding. This research may have major implications for preparing texts for distance education, for instance there are evidence that certain practices of introducing specific questions and learning activities in the text for arousing activity, may stimulate attention for surface level rather that deep level learning. Thus, more research, carefully planned and carried out, on how students approach learning in distance education and how material should be planned to stimulate the type of learning we are looking for is clearly needed.

There is a lot of research reports published on the use of new technology, audio and visual media. Tony Bates‘ (1984) book ‘The Role of Technology in Distance Education‘ and the bibliography from the Open University Audio-Visual Research Group, IET Papers on Broadcasting represent an introduction to the field. One should note that generally the research in the field does not give evidence that heavy use of expensive technology necessarily increases students‘ learning sufficiently to justify the costs involved (see for instance Bates (1990) strong arguments for the use of audio cassettes). Bates (1987) has also published an overview on a variety of TV applications in distance education, and Wittington (1987) has produced an overview on research and reported experiences on the instructional efficiency of television. In a general overview of media applications and research and forecasts for the future, Bates proposes the following concerning research priorities:

"Technological developments need to be preceded and accompanied by research and evaluation, to monitor carefully not only the learning but also cost and organisational implications. It is important that research priorities are carefully defined. At the moment, governments are giving priority to basic research in the area of artificial intelligence and for the development of interactive video. However, distance teaching institutions should be investing in more immediate and practical issues, such as monitoring student access to equipment, studying the design implications of video-cassettes, evaluating new types of course design based on new technology, and studying the cost and organisational implications of introducing new technology." (Bates 1988, 12)

Perhaps the greatest developments that have taken place the last few years concern tele-technology for two way communication and interaction between student and tutor and between students. A quick glance through the 5 last volumes of the major distance education periodicals (Appendix 1) shows that theoretical and empirical studies on teleconferencing (audio/video/computer) are frequently reported, being the main theme in at least 45 articles and are discussed in many others. The vast majority of the articles relates to electronic mail and computer conferencing, today often referred to as computer mediated communication (CMC).

Studies on CMC have been reported in such a quantity that it is impossible to go into details of specific projects here. We will mainly show to some few specific collections of articles and some major reports. Mason and Kaye (1989) have edited the papers and presentations from an international conference on computer mediated communication held in 1989 in the UK. The papers include theoretical positions on CMC in general, on teaching-learning strategies, costs and organisational problems as well as evaluation studies and practical examples. Another more recent collection of papers have been collected by Kaye (1992) also on theory, research and evaluation and software design issues. Burge (1992) has published an extensive bibliography on CMC including the following categories of publications: Educational contexts - general and institutional, participant/learner perspectives, tutor/moderator perspectives, messaging, tools and techniques and non-educational contexts. Paulsen (1992) has given an overview of developments in CMC reflecting the spectrum of systems from bulletin boards to future electronic universities with specific focus on pioneering projects. Wells (1992) has analysed the literature on CMC on three main dimensions, design of courses to maximise the potential of CMC, teaching considerations and institutional issues. For each dimensions she raises some questions, analyses how these have been treated in the literature and suggests future research.

It seems clear that CMC will find a central position in distance education. However, we would still argue that applications of computer mediated communication is in its infancy. Experiences so far have proved that it is possible to create a stimulating learning environment within electronic communication systems, but a lot more research is needed on how to exploit the new possibilities, teaching-learning strategies and social and cognitive aspects of learning in the new technological environments. The studies published have clearly proven that it is possible to carry out distance education via computer mediated communication in a variety of subjects at different levels. However, many of the reports represent enthusiastic messages from innovators, not always useful for really deciding objectively the success of the project, or descriptive accounts of numbers and types of messages and difficulties with technology and software. Time has come to design research projects to explore how computer mediated communication ought to be used to really exploit the possibilities and advantages of the medium that have been presented in theory.

Other examples on research on telecommunications technology cover projects on group based learning via audio and video conferencing, audio-graphics, telephone and fax applications for individual tutoring. Just as examples we could mention two projects on audio teleconferencing. Burge and Howard (1990) report a case study and evaluation of student perceptions of effects of the absence of visual cues in audio conferencing. Garrison (1990) has analysed audio conferences in relation to theories of interaction and carried out an evaluation of student views. As an example of research on video-conferencing, Simpson et al. (1991) report on an analysis of student performance and attitudes and comparisons between students in the originating and receiving classroom, costs and administrative problems.

The developments in tele-technology have caused some writers to use the expression the "the third generation" of distance education (Garrison 1985) and a forecast of diminishing boarders between distance and conventional education. This view could in some way be said to be supported by the "The 3rd. International Teleteaching Conference" in 1993 which brought together researchers and practitioners from distance education, traditional schools and universities and from the computer and tele-communication society (Davies & Samways (1993).

Starting the discussion on research on print, it is probably only natural to end this section with some reference to research on individual two way communication by written communication and assignments for submission. The question of turn around time was examined experimentally by Rekkedal (1983), who in an experimental study found significantly higher completion rates as a result of quicker response on students assignments. An international study planned to replicate this study (however in practice not carried out experimentally) did not confirm these findings (Barker et al. 1986). Diehl (1989a, 1989b) also report findings, not confirming Rekkedal‘s research on turn around time, and he has also presented theoretical arguments for the advantage of some delayed feedback. Another dimension of two way communication is the question of density of assignments and quantity of questions per assignment. Bååth‘s (1980) experiment series on these questions did not give any clear significant relationships between these variables and completions or achievements. The majority of distance teaching institutions both in developing and industrialised countries still rely on written communication based on assignments for submission (Schuemer 1988). Thus, questions concerning types of assignments, flexibility and freedom in submitting and in pacing of the studies, as well as questions concerning quantity and density of assignments for submission is still, in our view, an important area for further research.

Student support and counselling

Careful systems for student support and counselling have been seen as perhaps one of the most important elements in the distance education system (see for instance Moore‘s bibliography from 1983 referring to more than 70 articles related to this field from the first 24 issues of "Teaching at a Distance"). The theoretical approaches by Sewart (1978, 1980) stress the institution‘s continuity of concern for the quality of support of the student as the basis of the Open University‘s claimed success of high completion rates. Rekkedal (1985) has carried out an experimental study that strongly supported the hypothesis that personalising tutoring and integrating the tutor and counsellor roles may increase student satisfaction and completion rates in individual distance study.

The British Open University has arranged three conferences the theme of support and counselling in co-operation with the ICDE which have resulted in publications (Tait & Sewart 1983; Tait 1987, 1989). These publications give an extensive overview on theory, research and case studies on support and counselling in distance education.

Teaching in distance education and the development of teaching/learning material

The specific characteristics of distance education has led to the development of some specific pedagogical professions, two of these are the roles of the designer of distance learning materials and the distance teacher. Theoretical studies on the roles and professions of the distance educators and some few surveys among academics in distance education and in institutions planning or preparing for distance education have been carried out. Bååth & Wångdahl (1977) analysed the role of the correspondence tutor with specific emphasis on motivation of students. Harris (1975) carried out a survey among more than 500 correspondence tutors on who they were, their competencies for the work, their motivation and attitudes and their working methods. Anwyl & Bowden (1986) have surveyed the attitudes of academics to distance education in the light of political aims. Parer et al. (1985) reported on teacher‘s attitudes, competencies and teaching methods in distance education in Australia and New Zealand. Naidu (1987) has reported a survey among the teaching staff of the University of South Pacific on their involvement in instructional materials development for distance education, revealing a rather unsatisfactory picture concerning time available, possibilities of advance planning and institutional support services. Taylor & White (1991) has carried out a survey among academics in dual-mode institutions in Australia on attitudes towards distance teaching. Parer (1989, 1992) has edited two collections of articles on course development with emphasis on theory and practice in course development and on questions concerning the profession of course developers and designers. For a discussion of different approaches to the development of distance learning, either that theory should drive the practice of instructional design, or that the practice of instructional design is a craft informed, but not prescribed by theory, see the debate in Research in Distance Education during 1991 (Volume 3, 1-3).

A recent survey on attitudes towards distance education among academics in the USA (Clark 1993) concludes that academics are reserved towards distance study in higher education, a result that is not at all promising for the future development of distance education at universities and colleges in the USA.

Systems, administration, organisation and economy

Hundreds of descriptive overviews of individual distance teaching institutions of departments, their organisation, courses and students have been presented over the years, for instance at ICDE conferences. One full edition of "Distance Education" (Volume 4, 2,) was devoted to case studies of distance education in different countries. Keegan (1990) has presented an overview of types and models of distance education institutions. An international overview with case studies of distance teaching institutions in different areas of education has been presented by Koul and Jenkins (1990). Mugridge and Kaufman‘s (1986) book on Distance Education in Canada also contains a number of institutional descriptions. Another book by Paul (1990) discusses theoretical perspectives and practical matters concerning management of distance education.

Graff and Holmberg (1988) have presented an overview of organisation, method and media in 197 different institutions. The same study also resulted in a catalogue/description of all institutions taking part in the survey (Doerfert et al. 1988).

Different views on educational policy, efficiency and cost lies behind the establishment of single mode distance teaching institutions relative to organising traditional educational institutions into dual mode organisations by taking up distance teaching. Without going into this discussion here, it seems clear that institutional policy, organisational forms and the economy of different distance education systems, will continue to be one important research area for the future. Rumble (1992) takes up problems concerning cost-structures and organisational models for distance education and points out the competitive vulnerability of large scale single mode distance teaching institutions compared to dual mode institutions. The article has a number of references to studies on policy for distance education, different models and relative costs of different systems and technology.

Evaluation and quality development

Much of the research reported in the distance education literature involves elements of system evaluation. Still, evaluation, evaluation research and quality development can be said to constitute one specific research area with a specific set of methodological problems and different approaches how to design and carry out the projects, and how to report . For an introduction to evaluation and evaluation research we will point to Thorpe‘s (1988) book on practitioner based evaluation and the overview presented by Schuemer (1991) of evaluation theory and practices in selected distance education institutions around the world. Schuemer‘s book clearly demonstrates that researchers in distance education look upon research and evaluation studies as closely related. While formal research based evaluation has been a necessary and natural part of the activities of distance education institutions, concepts transferred from the business and industrial sector of quality assurance and total quality management are relatively new in our field. Tait (1993) has edited a selection of papers that gives an introduction to theory, practice and problems related to quality assurance in distance and open learning.

Some hopes and future strategies of distance education research

The above review hopefully shows that research is not lacking in distance education. We also find that the present theoretical debate and discussions on theory, philosophy and research methodology keep a high standard of reflection. The empirical research reported during the last few years, including a number of carefully designed experimental studies, also show that a lot of high quality research is taking place. This is a probably a result of the fact that today a number of academic institutions around the world have qualified research supervisors who also have authoritative insight in distance education. Thus, presently many graduate students qualify for research through research within distance education supervised by distance education researchers. We also observe a trend of distance education research finding its place within the traditional departments of education. This trend is clear, for instance in Norway, as a result of the traditional universities starting to develop and offer up distance and open learning programmes. Similar developments seems to taking place around the world, and might constitute a basis for building up in the future a closer relationship between distance education research and general and adult education research.

From our own experiences and from the literature reviewed, we will point to some challenges for the future of distance education research and to some possible recommendations and actions.

1. Distance education needs different kinds of research. As an applied professional field, it needs both basic research which tests and develops knowledge to guide practice, and it needs research to solve practical problems (Moore 1985). At the same time research directly designed to solve practical problems can contribute to theory building. It is also important to base practical research on theory, as a firm basis in theory will increase the value of practical research. Research for practice and research for theory both requires that the researchers take their time to examine what others have done before. There is obviously a risk of wasting both time and money, when, as we often see, people start experimenting and collecting data without surveying the research literature. This seems to be a major problem when new groups of people gain interest in distance education and start research with little information about what has been achieved in distance education research.
2. It is probable that co-operation on research might give better results than individual institution based projects. Ten years ago White and Taylor (1983) proposed a strategy for co-operative research in distance education:

   "A pragmatic and likely fruitful path for researchers to follow is outlined in stepwise fashion below:

   1. select an appropriate issue for investigation, e.g. study time and student achievement;
   2. conduct a thorough theoretical analysis based on an extensive review of the literature;
   3. generate specific, carefully articulated hypotheses;
   4. select an appropriate research methodology;
   5. select/design appropriate instrumentation;
   6. co-ordinate a series of action research projects on the selected issue in a variety of distance education settings."

   (White & Taylor 1983, 58)

   All these points constitute good advice. However, the last suggestion of carrying out a series of projects is perhaps the most important one. Collecting data from different sources and generating theory inductively are good advice. Other researchers have given similar suggestions. Moore (1985) sees such an approach as a way of successively building up a ‘grounded theory‘ of distance education. As examples of such approaches we could refer to Barker et al. (1986) who conducted an international co-operative study including 5 different institutions experimenting on two way communication and turn around time and feed back interval. Another example is the study on telephone tutoring (Flinck 1978) and postal two way communication (Bååth 1980) conducted by researchers at the University of Lund including experiments in a number of courses in different institutions around Europe. We would like to see the ICDE and its affiliated regional associations to take initiative to such co-operative research.

3. In the spirit of co-operation we would also like to see a further integration of research philosophies, methods and designs to take place. The community of educational researcher in general has gone through a period of strong debate and controversy on research methodology. This controversy has probably been a major obstacle to optimum development of theory and practice in education. This controversy has also been present among distance education researchers. It seems now that most researchers accept the possible contributions from different paradigms of research and that the development of theory and practice in distance education will benefit from co-operation between researchers with different research specialities, and also that many specific research projects may take advantage of applying research methods and techniques from both the naturalistic/qualitative and the experimental/quantitative tool kits of designs, methods and data (see Burge 1992, Coldeway 1988, 1990).
4. We opened this article by a statement of the need for integrating research and practice. This means that in the future we would like to see that practitioners would be more involved in research, and that they to a larger extent would apply research results in their practice. We would also like to see that researchers reported their results in ways and forms useful for the practitioners. To achieve research related to practice, we would recommend that professionals and managers in distance education generally had some training in research methods, statistics and basic problems concerned with generalisations, validity and reliability of results from empirical research. This would better prepare them to conduct their own research, to take part in research projects and to take advantage of research results for the development of their own practice.

   We would especially argue that practitioners should be involved in projects concerning evaluation of their own practice. Thorpe (1988) has given a good introduction to practitioner based evaluation. Although, some would exclude evaluation from the research concept (see for instance Coldeway 1988), the borders between evaluation, evaluation research and research is not clear. One should point out that evaluation research is immediately useful and thus more attractive to practitioners. This kind of projects may also constitute a good base for the learning of research methods as practical related research projects could be coupled with training in research skills. Calvert (1988) reports positive experiences with practice and project based research training. We would also recommend that research projects were more often were planned directly to involve the practitioners. From our own experiences we have seen that when people responsible for the functioning of the system are actively involved in research and evaluation projects the results become more easily and efficiently applied. The developments and changes that might be introduced as a result of practitioner related research tend to be accepted, to be followed up, and live. Another argument for practitioner based research is that distance education basically is a multi-disciplinary field involving aspects of economy, business administration, psychology, sociology, geography and many other disciplines. The practitioners represent these fields, and thus their contributions would be welcome.

5. The rapid developments in media and communication technologies give birth to new types of organisations, systems and programmes, and broaden the field of distance education research. There is a large need for research on how different students learn with different kinds of technology in different types of programmes. We would hope that future research in this area will be driven by educational theory rather than by the general enthusiasm of working with new technology. It seems that in most countries it is easier to fund technological driven projects initiated in technical oriented environments than projects with a background in the theory and practice of distance teaching and learning.
6. There is also a need to develop a consistent conceptual framework for research in distance education. Calvert (1986) has suggested a framework for conceptualisation which might be useful, especially to those new to research in the field. The framework indicates relationships between the input, process and outcome variables:

   INPUT VARIABLES

   Student

   • Educational background
   • Perceived needs
   • Motivation
   • Learning style
   • Study environment

   System

   • National requirements
   • Institutional policy
   • Financial resources
   • Technological resources
   • Human resources
   • Geography

   PROCESS VARIABLES

   Development

   • Curriculum
   • Development model
   • Design of instruction
   • Media
   • Course workload
   • Pacing
   • Production procedures

   Delivery

   • Recruitment methods
   • Academic support
   • Formal feedback

   OUTCOME VARIABLES

   Student

   • Enrolment
   • Academic progress
   • Academic performance
   • Use of materials and services
   • Drop out

   System

   • Development
   • Efficiency
   • Cost effectiveness
   • Acceptance in the system

   The design of a research project would work from the left to the right. As an example, based on theory of distance education as didactic conversation, one could design the teaching material and the teaching processes for students with different learning styles and measure academic progress as an outcome variable.

7. Some years ago ICDE had a modest programme of stimulating research, especially research based on co-operation between institutions and organisations in different countries. We hope that ICDE in co-operation with its affiliated regional associations will resume this activity. Regional and world wide electronic networks give new possibilities. ICDE has now signed a contract with the Commonwealth of Learning to encourage and facilitate research in distance education. As a first activity one has established a bulletin board for dissemination of information on research in progress or planned. Thus, researchers and practitioners now can provide and obtain information on research in their fields of interest, exchange information and establish relationships to co-operate and/or co-ordinate their efforts with others (see Open Praxis, 1993, 2, 45-46).

In conclusion - research in the field of distance education, to borrow an allegory from Moore (1985), seems to have developed through the stages of childhood and adolescence and is now in the process of growing up. Thus, in our view, there are good prospects for the future.

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