An exploration of instructional principles for human-dimensions of human-computer interaction within a web-mediated higher education setting

Students involved in online learning programmes need to engage in human interaction facilitated by information and communications technology (ICT) tools, rather than interact with the technology alone. The literature reveals many overlapping ideas and principles from three important research domains that include: behaviourism, cognitive psychology and the constructivists. Although many researchers concentrate on instructional design principles for Web-based education, it is left unclear, which instructional principles gauge the human-dimensions of human-computer interaction (HCI), within online learning. The purpose of this paper is to describe the preliminary work from a doctoral research programme underway at an Australian university. The outcomes of this work will encourage the HCI community to further explore new paradigms for social and computer-mediated interaction, and developing subsequent models and theories of online interaction.