Postsecondary Student Perspectives on Lifelong Digital Learning

18 university students participated in five online focus groups exploring digital technology's role in lifelong learning. The qualitative analysis produced 46 codes organized into 11 themes across Agency, Growth, Connection, and Envisioning Future categories. This conceptual framework illustrates how digital tools support students' psychological needs and shape their learning practices.

Use Cases

• Analyze the 46 discrete codes to identify patterns in student perspectives on digital technology and lifelong learning.
• Apply the 11 themes within the Agency, Growth, Connection, and Envisioning Future categories for thematic qualitative research.
• Use the conceptual framework derived from self-determination theory to study autonomy, competence, and relatedness in digital learning contexts.
• Examine focus group data on students' future professional status and relationship with technology for curriculum design insights.

Strengths

• Data is structured around a clear conceptual framework with 11 distinct themes.
• Analysis is grounded in self-determination theory, providing a theoretical lens for the 46 identified codes.
• Source data comes from 18 participants across five structured focus groups.

Limitations

• The dataset is very small in scale at 10.4 KB, containing qualitative analysis rather than quantitative data.
• Sample size is limited to 18 students from unspecified professional programs, limiting generalizability.
• Data format is a DOCX document, requiring manual extraction for computational analysis.

Provenance

Source

Author Tetiana Polishchuk via figshare.

Collection Method

Interpretive description using five online focus groups with 18 university students, analyzed via template and reflexive thematic analysis.

Freshness

Last updated March 25, 2026.