Where is Community Among Online Learners? Identity, Efficacy and Personal Ties

Research questions about community among online learners are gaining importance as enrollments in online programs explode. However, what community means for this context has not been studied in a comprehensive way. We contribute a quantitative study of learners’ feelings and behavior expectations about online community, adapting scales for sense of community (SOC) and developing an instrument to assess community collective efficacy (CCE). Our analysis of students’ responses to these scales revealed two factors underlying SOC (shared identity and interpersonal friendship) and three factors underlying CCE (identity regulation, coordination and social support). We used these factors to discuss contrasting definitions of community (shared identity versus ego networks). Exploratory data analyses also revealed relationships to other student variables that begin to articulate roles and mechanisms for online students’ felt community, and raise design implications about what we might do with and for the community structure.