Understanding the role of social media in informal learning by researchers in Malaysian higher education

Abstract

Social media is progressing rapidly, and it holds great potentials for everyday lives, including for educational purposes. These potentials can be harnessed in improving the acceptance of social media in informal learning. Informal learning has broken the barriers inherent in the old order of formal learning. However, there is a lack of research in social media acceptance relating to informal learning for academic researchers. This research aims to develop an acceptance model of social media for informal learning from an academic researcher's perspective. To achieve this aim, this research integrates two theories as to the foundation for the development of the model: Technology acceptance model 3 and theory of constructivism. The proposed model was evaluated using the quantitative approach with social media users. The proposed model includes key technological, individual, and interactive factors. The findings of this study provide an understanding of the interaction of social media and informal learning.