Students’ and Lecturers’ Awareness, Knowledge, and Usage of Extended Reality Technology in Nigerian Universities

Several underdeveloped and impoverished countries have struggled to manage the teaching and learning procedures since the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, as the learning process has assumed a new dimension of implementation of online learning. While extended reality technology (XRT) has been recognized as an exciting and appealing mode of instruction, its understanding remains superficial among students and lecturers in Nigerian universities. This study, therefore, investigated lecturers’ and students’ awareness, knowledge, and usage of XRTs and academic accomplishment, considering gender-related disparities. The cognitive theory of multimedia learning anchored the study, and hierarchical regression correlational design was used to explore lecturers’ and students’ awareness, knowledge, and usage of XRTs with the use of a validated instrument administered to 5,230 students and 1,587 lecturers across private and public universities in South-Western Nigeria. The statistical analysis consisted of stepwise hierarchical multiple linear regression depending on how the other factors relate to the structure. The findings revealed that students were never aware, had very little knowledge, and had never been using XRTs in school, with lecturers having average awareness of XRTs but had shallow knowledge and had never been using XRTs in school with gender indifference and a significant proportion of variance to the prediction of students’ academic achievement. Findings have implications for integrating XRTs into Nigerian universities’ instruction and learning procedures. There is a need for the Nigerian government to equip universities with the necessary hardware and software to support XRTs and integrate XRTs into the curriculum.