The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2002: §242c Home Papers/Indices prev (§242b) Next (§242d)

Paper (refereed) IT Education: Best Practices

Recommended Citation: Owen, W N and R B Sweeney. Ambiguity Tolerance, Performance, Learning, and Satisfaction: a Research Direction. In The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2002, v 19 (San Antonio): §242c. ISSN: 1542-7382.

Ambiguity Tolerance, Performance, Learning, and Satisfaction: a Research Direction

Refereed

William N. Owen    [a1] [a2]
School of Computer and Information Sciences
University of South Alabama    [u1] [u2]
Mobile, Alabama, USA    [c1] [c2]

Robert B. Sweeney, Jr.    [a1] [a2]
School of Computer and Information Sciences
University of South Alabama    [u1] [u2]
Mobile, Alabama, USA    [c1] [c2]

This paper describes an effort to assess student tolerance for ambiguity in assignments and its effect on performance, learning, and satisfaction. It is part of a continuing research effort to discover and comprehend the relationship between ambiguity tolerance and learning. Many factors affect a student's ability to learn including those controlled by personality and cognitive characteristics. Tolerance for ambiguity has been previously explored as a possible mitigating variable in individual behavior. In this project, student's in an upper level course in Information Technology rated the ambiguity of projects completed during the class. Additionally, the student's tolerance for ambiguity was measured using two previously developed psychometric instruments and correlated with student ambiguity tolerance ratings for each project. An explanation is offered for the significant correlation found for one of the projects.

Keywords: ambiguity tolerance, performance, learning, satisfaction, project, instructions

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