Digital Behavior of University Students in India and the U.S. Cultural Values and Communication Technologies in the Classroom

Focusing on Indian and American university students, this investigation explores the impact of authority values on students’ classroom digital behavior in individualistic and collectivistic societies. The results indicate that university students in India and the U.S. differ significantly in (1) frequency of digital usage, (2) preferred classroom policies to control usage, (3) perceived impact of digital usage on learning, attention, and student participation, (4) and preferred instructor strategies for handling distracting uses of digital media. The findings are discussed in terms of Indian and U.S. cultural value differences in the source and focus of authority within collectivistic and individualistic societies.