An investigation of students and teachers’ new media literacy: the contributing characteristics with the moderator role of gender

Abstract

This study aims to investigate students and teachers’ new media literacy in addition to the contributing factors with a relatively large sample size. In this sense, the current study is considered unique as it provides findings from both student and teacher participants, and investigates the contributing factors to their new media literacy with the moderation of gender. The new media literacy framework was adopted as the theoretical base, and students and teachers’ new media literacy was investigated in terms of consuming and prosuming dimensions. The data were collected from 1195 students studying in primary, middle, and high schools (including rural and urban areas) and 581 teachers. The findings revealed that teachers’ literacy is higher than students’ at all educational levels for all dimensions of the new media literacy framework. It was also found that students’ educational level and ICT teachers’ subject field positively contribute to their literacies in all dimensions. While teachers’ age negatively contributes only to their prosuming skills, it has no influence on their consuming skills. Finally, no significant moderating effect of gender was observed on these relationships while it is found as a predictor of both students and teachers’ prosuming skills, and also teachers’ functional consuming skills. For these skills in both groups, male participants demonstrated higher literacy than females. Rather than generational differences, the findings underline the role of formal and informal experience in the development of digital literacies, particularly in critical dimensions, and were further discussed based on the current literature.