Predicting Academic Achievement with an Emphasis on Effective Variables in E-Learning and Academic Engagement

This study primarily aims to investigate direct impact of the variables of experience, anxiety, computer self-efficacy and academic engagement in relation to academic achievement of the students at Payame Noor University of Fars Province. Its method is correlation. Using Kerjessi and Morgan formula, the researchers selected 410 students from among those studying at the Payame Noor University of Fars Province with random sampling method. The data collection instruments in this study include the standards questionnaires analyzed by means of route analysis and Lisrel application. The variables of cognitive, motivational and behavioral engagement, computer self-efficacy and computer anxiety have a direct, significant impact on the students’ academic achievement. Therefore, the research hypotheses are verified, i.e. the variable of computer self-efficacy has a direct, significant effect on the students’ cognitive, motivational and behavioral engagement; the variables of computer experience and computer anxiety have a direct, significant impact on the students’ computer self-efficacy; and ultimately, computer experience has a reverse, significant effect on the students’ computer anxiety. In examining overall and direct effects, it was found out that out of the effective variables in academic achievement, computer self-efficacy with an overall effect of 0.39 has the greatest impact on academic achievement, and cognitive engagement with a direct effect of 0.24 vis-à-vis other variables has the greatest effect on the students’ academic achievement, while the variable of computer anxiety is the only one which has a reserve effect vis-à-vis other research variables. Moreover, the model has a good and ideal fit toward the data.