Design and psychometric of a questionnaire to identify the challenges of virtual education in the epidemic of Covid-19

The importance of e-learning in the days of Covid-19 reached its peak due to the absenteeism of university education, but its use for learners was associated with challenges. The purpose of this study was to design an E-learning challenges questionnaire (ECQ) for the assessment of learning challenges in the student in university.

This is a descriptive cross-sectional study that was conducted in 2020 in the paramedical faculty of Hamadan University of Medical Sciences. The study population consisted of 683 students who according to Morgan table a sample of 295 people were selected based on inclusion criteria by stratified random sampling method. The data collection tool was a researcher-made questionnaire that was used to determine the validity of experts' opinions. To determine the dimension of questionnaire and its internal consistency exploratory factor analysis and Cronbach's alpha coefficient were used. This data was analyzed with SPSS 26.

In general, 5 factors (conditions and motivation of learners, teacher and teaching method, ability to have universal access to the Internet, support and officials, technical) explain a total of 60/895% of the total variance, which is the factor of inclusive conditions and motivation with/4.796% had the highest share and the technical factor with 3/054% had the lowest share in the explanation.

The most important problems of students in using virtual education in the days of Covid-19 were the conditions and motivation of the learners themselves, while motivation is directly related to the success and performance of students. Accordingly, professors have a very important role in motivating learners through the use of teaching methods with the active participation of students.