The Role of the Instructors as a Determinant of Students´ Satisfaction in University Online Education

This study examines the role of the instructor as a determinant of students´ satisfaction in the context of university online course. A total of 397 valid unduplicated responses from the students who have completed at least one online course at a university in the Midwestern United States were used to fit the structural equation model using LISREL 8.7. All of the antecedent constructs hypothesized to affect user satisfaction except one (instructor care and responsiveness) are not significant suggesting that instructor knowledge, instructor facilitation/ stimulation, and instructor feedback did not affect the perceived satisfaction of students who take Web-based courses. Therefore, the construct measuring instructors´ individual attention to students and responsiveness to students concerns is the most influential factor to significantly increase the satisfaction of students taking online classes. The findings suggest that personal care for each student is the critical element that can activate students´ metacognition. Metacognitive feedback directs the learner´s attention to learning outcomes and therefore may lead to a high level of students´ satisfaction