Critical Digital Citizenship: a scale development and validation study

Title

Critical Digital Citizenship: a scale development and validation study

Creator

Dass, M. Anthony; Kumar, M. P. M. Pramod

Description

The rise of digital technologies, on one hand, has transformed the way learners interact with digital environments. On the other hand, we witness the digital divide and biases associated with it. This calls for a redefinition of digital citizenship. This prompted us to develop the Critical Digital Citizenship (CDC) Scale to assess school teachers competencies in using technology responsibly and critically interacting with online and internet environments. This scale focuses on key features such as Knowledge, Attitude, Skills, Critical Perspectives. An exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were carried out. The following goodness-of-fit index values were obtained: ?2 = 612.39, df = 266, P = 0.00, RMSEA = 0.059, GFI = 0.891, AGFI = 0.867, CFI = 0.922, RMR = 0.049; TLI = 0.912. The overall Cronbachs alpha reliability value of the test was 0.823. The composite reliability exceeds 0.7 for every factor and the AVE > 0.5. After analysing the data, it was found that the Critical Digital Citizenship Scale (CDCS) is a valid and reliable tool for assessing the CDC competency level of teachers. The CDC scale addresses the urgent need to equip individuals with the skills to discern credible information, recognize bias, and engage in responsible, informed digital participation. This will also serve as a valuable resource for school teachers, educators, policy makers, and administrators to understand and implement critical digital citizenship in schools, as well as for researchers seeking to foster critically perspective towards digital and internet integration in education. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V. 2024.

Source

International Journal of Technology and Design Education;Volume;35;Issue;4;pp.1493-1513

Date

01-01-2025

Publisher

Springer Science and Business Media B.V.

Subject

Critical digital citizenship scale; Critical perspectives; Scale development and validation; School teachers

Coverage

Dass M.A., School of Education, Christ University, Bengaluru, India; Kumar M.P.M.P., School of Education, Christ University, Bengaluru, India

Rights

Restricted Access; Hardcopy may be available in the library

Relation

ISSN: 9577572; CODEN: IJDEE

Format

online

Language

English

Type

Article

Identifier

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10798-024-09960-z

https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85217185829?origin=resultslist