Social Capital of Students in the Digital Educational Environment: Offline and Online Learning

The transition to mass digital education has aroused the interest of domestic and foreign researchers to discuss issues of the new educational reality and its impact on various aspects of higher education. This article joins this discussion. In particular, it examines the question of what happens to the social capital of students in the context of mass distance (online) learning. Following J. Coleman, the work analyzes the forms of social capital: trusting relationships and mutual obligations (mutual assistance), as well as group norms. In the latter case, we consider the self-determination of students as «students» or «non-students» as an indirect indicator. According to the study, online learning differs from offline learning regarding these forms of social capital. With online learning, level of student trust in fellow students and teachers decreases; they have fewer social contacts among them, to whom they can turn for help in matters of study and non-study. Students who self-identify as «non-students», as opposed to those who identify as «students», are less willing to build trusting relationships and networks of mutual assistance (mutual obligations) with fellow students and teachers. «Non-students» are more likely to study remotely, and they prefer online communication with teachers more. The general conclusion is that social capital decreases during online learning, which raises the question of the effectiveness of socialization of young people within this learning format.