Development of internet literacy self-efficacy scale for pre-service teachers

Abstract

This study aims to develop the Internet Literacy Self-Efficacy Scale (ILSEF) that can be used to examine pre-service teachers’ beliefs in their capabilities to perform recent web functionalities. The data was collected from eight different departments and all grade levels of the faculty of education at a state university in Turkey. Two different samples were used to develop and validate the instrument. The first and second samples consisted of 174 and 150 pre-service teachers, respectively. In an effort to explore the factorial structure, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were run. Construct validity was also checked by convergent and discriminant validity. A four-factor structure with 16 items was obtained: trustworthiness, creation, technical knowledge, and getting information. This structure accounted for 65.40% of the total variance. The reliability Cronbach alpha coefficients of the scale were calculated as ranging from .90 to .71. The results provided some evidence that the scores obtained from the Internet Literacy Self-Efficacy Scale are valid and reliable in assessing pre-service teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs in terms of the Internet use knowledge and skills.