An investigation into the motivational design qualities of web-based instructional materials

The purpose of this study was to assess the presence and absence of the motivational design components of John Keller's ARCS model of motivational design inWeb-Based Instruction. Seventy five undergraduate students enrolled in the Spring Semester 1999 at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and three other universities whose courses had a Web-presence at the World Lecture Hall on the Internet were asked to evaluate their Web-Based Instructional materials. The instrument used to evaluate theWeb-Based Instructional materials was John Keller's Instructional MaterialsMotivational Survey. Results from Repeated Measures of ANOVA indicated a general presence of the four motivational components (Attention, Relevance, Confidence & Satisfaction) of the ARCS model. Confidence subscale was rated highest. This finding did not support Duchastel's assumptions that WBI provided only for the first two factors(Attention and Relevance) but might be problematic for the latter two (Confidence andSatisfaction) in ARCS Model. Two-tailed T-test yielded significant differences between"the best sites and the worst sites in the mean scores of the four individual subscales and the sum scores of the four subscales. Such results provided some support for the utility of the ARCS model in assessing the Web-Based Instructional Materials.