Research Question 1 – What are the expectations of distance education students towards studentto-
student interaction in distance education classes?
In general, the respondents did not value student-to-student interaction in distance
education classes. The mean score for the 18 statements on the instrument was a 2.66, which falls
between the disagree and neither agree nor disagree scales on the instruments. Of the 18 statements
on the instrument only five received a rating above 3.0, which is the mid-point, but the ratings were
barely above a 3.0. When one realizes it was possible for an item to get a mean score of 5.0 for a
strongly agree rating, these ratings were not very positive. The three highest rated statements were
“I feel I learn more in a course when I have the opportunity to engage with my peers”, “I care about
other students in my DE courses”, and “Interaction with other students enhances my learning of the
content.”