The exploration of elementary school teachers' internet self-efficacy and information commitments: A study in Taiwan

This study aimed to explore teachers' Internet self-efficacy and information commitments. More importantly, this study also attempted to identify possible factors that affect the teachers' Internet self-efficacy. The participants were 301 elementary school teachers. In this study, the Internet Self-efficacy Survey (ISS) and the Information Commitments Survey (ICS) were used. Through both exploration factor analyses (EFA) and confirmatory factor analyses (CFA), this study reconfirmed the validity and reliability of the two instruments. This study revealed that the teachers, in general, expressed satisfactory Internet self-efficacy and relatively tended to use advanced information commitments. The correlational analyses revealed that the teachers' information commitments were significantly correlated with their Internet self-efficacy (p < .05). In order to examine if the teachers' information commitments were influential factors for their Internet self-efficacy, a series of structural equation modeling (SEM) analyses was conducted. The SEM analyses further confirmed that the teachers' information commitments were significant factors affecting their Internet self-efficacy. The finding above was then discussed based on Bandura's self-efficacy theory. Also, some important implications on educational practices and future research were discussed.