Enhancing Knowledge Transfer in Classroom Versus Online Settings: The Interplay Among Instructor, Student, Content, and Context

This article integrates management education and organizational learning theories to identify the factors that drive the differences in student outcomes between the online and classroom settings. We draw upon theory on knowledge transfer barriers in organizations to understand the interlinking relationships among presage conditions, deep learning process, and product in the 3P model of student learning. We test our model in the context of undergraduate education and find that confidence in the instructor's expertise, perceived content relevance, and the social richness of the classroom learning environment enhance student enjoyment of the course. Confidence in instructor's expertise and perceived content relevance also contribute to greater understanding of causal relationships among course concepts. Enjoyment is positively associated with learning performance in the classroom, but not online, and student ability is positively associated with learning performance in the online context, but not in the classroom. Our results have implications for course designs in the traditional classroom context and the more innovative online environment.