Peruvian undergraduate students’ usage of digital technology in academic context

Abstract

This paper presents the results of an interview of first-year university students at a private face-to-face university in Lima city on how they use digital technologies in their social and academic lives. This study was positioned in the interpretive paradigm with qualitative research design. Semi-structured interview with 13 open-ended questions was selected as the means of data. Atlas.ti. were used to analysed and coded all the interviews. To provide a well-structured approach to handling a large data set, thematic analysis was employed to analyse the verbatim transcription as outlined by Braun and Clarke. Contrary to the assumption that young learners are seen as highly adept technology users, the findings show that social networks (Facebook and Instagram) and WhatsApp are the most important applications for the participants.