Antecedents of Usability to Sustain Users’ Engagement in Online Learning

The development of an effective and usable Instructional Design based on the principles of Aesthetic Visual Design (AVD), along with the incorporation of Gamification (GMF), is essential for students’ motivation, engagement, learning, and comprehension. The majority of online course developers do not fully utilize the world of Visual Design because they do not realize the significant role played by AVD courses in making essential content/information reachable and understandable to learners. Therefore, a study was conducted on academicians who delivered online education, and students who undertook online education in undergraduate and post-graduate degree programs at public & private universities in a variety of courses with the goal to examine the complex interactions between constructs (i.e. AVD, ID, and GMF) and their impact on e-learning usability through mixed-method approach. The analysis of the study revealed that academicians found the influence of game mechanics the most important followed by game dynamics, game elements, and motivation whereas students valued game elements the most important followed by motivation, game dynamics, and game mechanics. As the analysis among academicians and students revealed variation, it requires further validation with different samples.