=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-3070/paper02
|storemode=property
|title=Emotions and Student eXperience: A Literature Review
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-3070/paper02.pdf
|volume=Vol-3070
|authors=Nicolás Matus,Sandra Cano,Cristian Rusu
}}
==Emotions and Student eXperience: A Literature Review==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-3070/paper02.pdf
Emotions and Student eXperience: A Literature Review
Nicolás Matus [0000-0001-5712-7107], Sandra Cano [0000-0001-9583-8532], Cristian Rusu [0000-0002-
1504-2540]
Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, Av. Brasil 2241, Valparaíso 2340000, Chile
nicolas.matus.p@mail.pucv.cl, sandra.cano@pucv.cl,
cristian.rusu@pucv.cl
Abstract. Student eXperience (SX) covers a broad range of aspects, including
the emotional one. The importance of emotions is more evident when we analyze
SX as a particular case of Customer eXperience (CX), which considers the
emotional customer-brand relationship. For this reason, it is important to analyze
the role that emotional aspects have in SX. This article presents a literature review
of the last 5 years (between 2015 and 2021) regarding the impact of emotions on
SX. The results show that there is a lack of studies that address the topic from a
CX perspective. Articles analyze mainly three aspects: students’ well-being, their
learning experiences, and their engagement.
Keywords: Student eXperience, Customer eXperience, Emotions, Literature
Review.
1 Introduction
The satisfaction and well-being of students are conditioned by the quality of
interactions with their respective Higher Education Institutions (HEI). These
interactions are studied in a wide variety of topics (Hong et al. 2020) [1], which are
influenced by multiple factors. This leads us to the concept of Student eXperience (SX).
Since the SX can be conceived as a particular case of Customer eXperience (CX) within
the student environment, the analysis of these experiences can be carried out from a CX
perspective.
According to Hill et al. CX includes “the physical and emotional experiences
occurring through the interactions with the product and/or service offering of a brand
from the point of first direct, conscious contact, through the total journey to the post-
consumption stage” [2]. Other authors, such as Klaus & Maklan, specifically focuses
their definition on affective aspect [3].
Copyright © 2021 for this paper by its authors.
Use permitted under Creative Commons License Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
2
Although the concept of CX may differ from definition to definition, the importance
of the emotional and affective aspects of interactions are a common ground. It is
therefore interesting to collect information and analyze the role and implications of
emotions in SX. Emotions are highly relevant in Human Computer-Interaction (HCI).
In recent years HCI scholars show an increasing interest in CX.
We carried out a literature review in order to analyze the role and impact of emotions
on SX. We want to better understand the emotions nature of SX, in order to improve its
evaluation, and to hopefully enhance students’ satisfaction. We used 5 scientific
databases: Scopus, Science Direct, Web of Science, ACM Digital Library, and IEEE
Xplore. In this review we searched for articles published between 2015 and 2021,
following as guide the framework proposed by Kitchenham, initially designed to carry
out literature reviews in software engineering [4].
2 Background
2.1 Customer eXperience
The understanding of CX concept is of vital importance to satisfy the needs and engage
the clients of a company. Klaus & Maklan define CX as “the customer’s cognitive and
affective assessment of all direct and indirect encounters with the firm relating to their
purchasing behavior” [3]. Other authors, such as Lemon & Verhoef, have defined CX
as “a multidimensional construct focusing on a customer’s cognitive, emotional,
behavioral, sensory, and social responses to a firm’s offerings during the customer’s
entire purchase journey” [5]. Customer journey includes the “collections of touchpoints
between users and organizations” where touchpoints are the combination of channel,
device, and user task [6]. Understanding the nature of these interactions may be related
to the HCI area as they may be subject to the use of a computerized products, systems
or services.
All CX definitions refer in some way to emotions and/or affective aspects. Since the
customer-company interactions can be both physical and emotional [2], it is interesting
to analyze how emotions manifests, and how they impact the customers, in our case the
students. In this article we focus on analyze the role that emotions have in SX, and the
way in which they affect it.
2.2 Student eXperience
Student eXperience is a subject widely covered in the literature. A large number of
topics related to students' experiences have been detected. Hong et al. have identified
through text mining the research trends related to SX. Twenty-one topics referring to
the SX were identified, where the affective and emotional aspects are related to the
“First-year transitions” and “Assessment and feedback” topics respectively [1].
One of the perspectives for analyzing the interactions and perceptions of students is
that of CX. In this way, the SX is a particular case of CX where the customer-brand
relationship is specified in a student-HEI interaction. In this way, SX can be defined
from a CX approach as all the perceptions that a student experiences when interacting,
3
both physically and emotionally, with the products, systems or services offered by a
HEI. SX includes the whole student’s journey, from the “pre-consumption” stage to the
“post-consumption” stage and contemplating external and internal spaces to the HEI.
Our study looks for the role that emotions have in student-HEI interactions, and what
is the emotions’ impact on SX.
2.3 Emotions
Although there’s no general agreed definition for "emotions" in scientific community,
several definitions and theoretical models have been outlined, in different areas. Sherer
has defined emotions according to the framework of the component process model as
"an episode of interrelated, synchronized changes in the states of all or most of the five
organismic subsystems in response to the evaluation of an external or internal stimulus
event as relevant to major concerns of the organism” [7] [8].
The role of emotions and their impact on SX are important, since emotional stimuli
can occur as a result of student-HEI interactions in different touchpoints. Affective
analysis is important in first-year students, since it has been observed how emotions
have effects over short- and long-term adaptational outcomes [9]. It is important when
talking about emotions to emphasize that these are part of the affective process of
people, which is a broader concept. Affection is a cognitive process that involves the
relationship of organisms and includes feelings, in addition to emotions. The study of
emotions is especially relevant in the area of affective computing. In it, systems and
devices for cognition, interpretation, and processing of users emotions are analyzed and
developed. This is an interdisciplinary field that is usually framed within the HCI.
Evaluating emotions in SX is an important aspect. It is evident that given the large
number of topics that the SX encompasses [1], assessing students’ emotions may be
complex. This difficulty is also influenced by the need for multidimensional evaluation
models [10].
3 Research Method
This literature review was performed with the guide of a framework for performing
literature review in software engineering, proposed by Kitchenham [4], which includes
the following 3 phases: i) Planning the review, which involve the definition of the
research questions, ii) Conducting the review, which involves the development of the
search strategies and data extraction criteria, and iii) Reporting the review, which
involve the presentation and discussion of the results of the review.
To ensure the rigor of the literature review, the checklist of elements proposed by
the PRISMA methodology was used, focused on improving the content of a literature
review and meta-analysis [11].
4
3.1 Research Question
We oriented the literature review to the following elements: (1) the topics that deal
with emotional aspects regarding SX, (2) the impact of emotions on SX, and (3) the
methods that are used to evaluate emotions in the SX. Table 1 presents the research
questions (RQs) that guided the study.
Table 1. Research questions utilized in the literature review.
ID Research Questions (RQ)
RQ1 What kind of topics address the emotions in SX?
RQ2 How do emotions affect SX?
RQ3 What methods are used to evaluate emotions in SX?
3.2 Search Strategy
For this research we examined the literature published within the last 5 years (from
2015 to 2021), indexed in five databases: Scopus, Science Direct, Web of Science,
ACM Digital Library, and IEEE Xplore. The search strings were formulated based on
the relevant topics to the literature review. In all five databases we searched for three
terms, using the following conceptual string search: “Student experience” and
(“Emotions” or “Affective”). The number of indexed studies in each database and the
percentage of contribution to the total results are described in Table 2.
Table 2. Search results in databases using the search strings.
Database Number of articles % of articles
Scopus 356 70.9%
Science Direct 89 17.7%
Web of Science 45 9.0%
ACM DL 8 1.6%
IEEE Xplore 4 0.8%
Fig. 1 presents the percentage of studies indexed in each database. Scopus offers by
far the largest number of studies (70.9%), while IEEE Xplore offers the fewest (0.8%).
Since Scopus indexes studies referring to various areas, it is understandable that a large
number of documents appear in this database. It is interesting to note that both ACM
Digital Library and IEEE Xplore feature a small percentage of documents. This is due
to the subject area that these databases handle, referring to electronics, computer
science and engineering. This shows a low interest on the impact of emotions on the
SX within these areas.
Fig. 2 indicates the area of knowledge associated to the 356 documents indexed in
Scopus database. By far, most studies are associated to Social Sciences (242).
5
Fig. 1. Articles percentage by scientific databases.
Fig. 2. Subject area distribution of the documents found in Scopus.
6
Fig. 3. Subject area distribution of the documents found in Web of Science.
Fig. 3 indicates that most of the documents found in Web of Science database are
related to Education/Educational Research (35).
Fig. 4. Subject area distribution of the documents found in Science Direct.
Fig. 4 indicates that most of the documents found in Science Direct database are also
related to Social Science (63).
7
We found 4 documents in IEEE Xplore (Fig. 5), most of them related to Educational
Courses.
Fig. 5. Subject area distribution of the documents found in IEEE Xplore.
On Fig. 6 a growing tendency can be observed in the number of publications that
contain the terms "Student experience" and “Emotions”/”Affective” over the years. We
can infer that the number of articles published until the end of 2021 will increase
significantly; of the date of this document (April 2021), 42 articles have already been
available in the databases consulted.
Fig. 6. Total number of publications per year indexed in the five databases.
8
3.3 Studies Selection
We searched for studies focusing on the impact of emotions on SX in all areas and
including all types of research methods. The inclusion criteria are described in Table 3.
As indicated in Table 4 the study was limited to higher education experiences, at
undergraduate level.
Table 3. Inclusion criteria for this review.
Id Inclusion Criteria (IN)
IN1 Articles regarding the research questions
IN2 All field/disciplines, and all type of research methods
Table 4. Exclusion criteria for this review.
Id Exclusion Criteria (EX)
EX1 Articles out of time range
EX2 Articles that do not focus on higher education students
We fully analyzed only a selected number of articles, that we found more relevant
for our research topic. We also have to point out that our review also includes articles
that did not meet some of the previously mentioned criteria, but we find them highly
relevant [12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18]. It is important to mention that this study is a non-
systematic literature review, so the management of duplicate articles is not a major
issue.
4 Answering the Research Questions
4.1 RQ1: What kind of topics address the emotions in SX?
The students’ experiences are developed in a wide range of topics, such as: learning
[19, 20, 21, 22], role of services [23], educational transition [24, 25], and engagement
[26, 27, 28]. We observed that the articles focus broadly on 3 categories: i) Pedagogical
approach, where the learning experiences and outcomes are analyzed, ii) Focus on
engagement, where the student-HEI commitment and their motivation are analyzed,
and iii) Focus on student well-being, where the emotional health of students is analyzed.
It should be noted that all the articles analyzed used self-reported methods to collect
information regarding the emotions of the students, such as questionnaires and
interviews. In one article text mining was subsequently used to analyze the data
obtained [19].
9
4.2 RQ2: How do emotions affect SX?
Regarding the impact of emotions in SX, the role of emotions in learning experiences
is the most discussed aspect in the literature. Reisenzein & Döring have proposed that
emotions have three properties: i) immediate awareness, ii) phenomenal quality, and
iii) intentionality [12]. According to them, the learning experiences would be involved
in all these 3 properties. Several studies highlight how emotions directly affect students'
motivation, which influences their learning process. Goebel & Maistry have observed
the effect of emotions on motivation, behavior and outcomes in economic learning [20].
Troop et al. have investigated User eXperience Design Learning (UXDL) and have
observed its effect on student motivation, which improves their learning outcomes [21].
This is due to the effect of the material design that encourages the learner’s attention to
relevant information [16], and the willingness to engage with these material [17].
The student’s attitude in learning experiences is not passive. Rentzios et al. explored
the relationship between emotional regulation, defense mechanisms, and learning. The
study makes explicit the role of defense mechanisms as mediating factors in the
relationship between academic emotions and learning. This relationship is more evident
when an immature defense style is observed on the part of the students [22].
The role that services has in SX is remarkable, especially in the field of learning
experiences, motivation and performance. Tan et al. have analyzed the relationship
between students and educational services, focusing on the importance of empathy on
interactions. Empathy, which is composed of cognitive and affective aspects, can
manifest itself in the interaction between students and staff. An interaction with
empathy as a mediator factor can influence the motivation and academic performance
of students [23]. The need for empathic interaction is especially evident in culturally
diverse students on campus, as this affective component helps them adapting [15].
Several articles have analyzed the relationship between feelings and student
engagement with their HEI. Kahu et al. have extensively studied the role of student
engagement, regarding students' self-efficacy, emotions, belonging and well-being. In
these studies, the importance of emotions as inhibitors of engagement and as outcomes
has become evident, being a determining factor for academic success. An assertion is
highlighted urging HEIs to recognize that each student journey is idiosyncratic [14, 18,
24, 26]. Cownie highlight the importance of the affective environment in student
engagement. She recognized 3 factors that drive the student commitment which are: i)
students’ affective commitment towards academics, ii) students’ calculative
commitment towards the institution, and iii) commitment balance, which contemplates
a reciprocal reaction by the HEIs regarding the student's commitment. In these factors
the recognition of emotions between the interacting parties is vital [27].
It is important to observe how emotions impact on student’s well-being is manifested
from early stages of their interaction with the educational institutions, from their first-
year transition to the final stages of their student life. Young et al. mention how negative
emotions such as stress impact through and beyond HE studies, especially during the
transition of fresh students [25]. Similarly, Parker mentions how emotions influence
the late stages of the student's journey, reflecting on the students' professional identity
[28]. In this way, it is evident how students’ emotions cross the threshold of the
10
classroom and manifest in aspects of their daily life, before and after interacting with
HEI.
4.3 RQ3: What methods are used to evaluate emotions in SX?
As mentioned, when answering the first research question, a large number of articles
use self-reported methods (mainly interviews, questionnaires, and surveys) to find out
about students' experiences. In the articles analyzed, however, variations could be
observed in the processing and postprocessing mechanisms of the reported data.
It is of special interest an article by Tzacheva et al. which used text mining to process
the feedback provided by students, to detect and analyze emotions, in order to identify
the impact of active learning methods [19]. This process used the sentiment dictionary
Multi-Perspective Question Answering (MPQA) [13]. The authors highlight how
negative emotions are one of the main reasons for student to dropping out their studies
in HEIs.
In articles referring to the interaction of students with educational services, quality
questionnaires are used to analyze the experience of students. Tan et al. are using the
general, well-known SERVQUAL scale [23]. This can be a problem if we consider that
the SERVQUAL dimensional instability has been reported [29, 30, 31].
5 Conclusions & Future Work
The importance of emotion analysis from early to late stages of the student’s
experiences is evident. This considering the role they have as: i) inhibitors or enhancers
of engagement, ii) agents that enhance or diminish motivation and attention, and iii)
elements that facilitate empathic communication between subjects. All of these roles
have a proven impact on academic outcomes and student well-being.
Interestingly, there’s a lack of articles that analyze the impact of emotions on SX
from a CX perspective. This does not prevent the identification of factors related to CX
in the articles we have analyzed, such as physical or emotional interactions between
students and actors from the academic environment. These interactions are carried out
directly between subjects and services, or through the use of graphic study material.
The generalized use of self-reported methods to collect information regarding the
emotional experience of students, such as questionnaires and interviews, is also
observed. This can be a problem given the length and particularity of the student
journey. For this reason, we believe that it is more appropriate to analyze the temporal
evolution of the emotional impact throughout the student's journey, rather than carry
out evaluations at the end of it.
Given the lack of articles with a CX perspective and the lack of a continuous
evaluation of the emotional impact on SX, we find it necessary to carry out future work
on the matter. We hope to identify mechanisms to evaluate the emotional impact on
students, throughout the touchpoints of their journey as customers. In this way the
analysis will be more accurate, as it will better adjust to the specificity of each journey.
11
Due the lack of definition of SX from a CX perspective, we intend to carry out a
systematic literature review on SX definitions, aspects, and evaluation methods.
Acknowledgments. Nicolás Matus is a beneficiary of the PUCV PhD Scholarship
2021, in Chile.
References
1. Hong S., Park T., Choi J.: Analyzing Research Trends in University Student Experience
Based on Topic Modeling. Sustainability (Switzerland) 12(9):3570 (2020).
https://doi.org/10.3390/su12093570
2. Hill, N., Roche, G., Allen, L.: Customer Satisfaction. The Customer Experience Through
the Customer’s Eye. 1st edn. Cogent Publishing, London (2007).
3. Klaus, P., Maklan, S.: Towards a better measure of customer experience. Int. J. Market Res.
55(2), pp. 227–246 (2013). https://doi.org/10.2501/IJMR-2013-021
4. Kitchenham, B.A.: Procedures for undertaking systematic reviews. Joint Technical report.
Computer Science Department, Keele University and National ICT Australia Ltd. (2004).
5. Lemon, K.N., Verhoef, P.C.: Understanding customer experience throughout the customer
journey. J. Mark. 80(6), pp. 69–96 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1509/jm.15.0420
6. Nielsen Norman Group, https://www.nngroup.com/articles/channels-devices-touchpoints/,
last accessed 2021/04/17.
7. Scherer K. R.: Toward a Dynamic Theory of Emotion: The Component Process Model of
Affective States. Geneva Studies in Emotion and Communication 1, pp. 1–98 (1987).
8. Scherer K. R., Schorr A., Johnstone T.: Appraisal Processes in Emotion: Theory, Methods,
Research. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press (2001).
9. Lazarus, R. S.: Emotion and adaptation. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press (1991).
10. Mauss, I. B., Robinson, M. D.: Measures of emotion: A review. Cognition & emotion. 23(2),
pp. 209–237 (2009). doi: 10.1080/02699930802204677
11. Prisma Statement, http://www.prisma-statement.org/, last accessed 2021/04/17.
12. Reisenzein R., Döring, S.: Ten Perspectives on Emotional Experience: Introduction to the
Special Issue. Emotion Review 1(3), pp. 195-205 (2019).
https://doi.org/10.1177/1754073909103587
13. Stoyanov, V., Cardie, C., & Wiebe, J.: Multi-perspective question answering using the
OpQA corpus. In Proceedings of the conference on Human Language Technology and
Empirical Methods in Natural Language Processing, pp. 923-930 (2005).
http://dx.doi.org/10.3115/1220575.1220691
14. Kahu, E. R.: Framing Student Engagement in Higher Education. Studies in Higher
Education 38, pp. 758–773 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2011.598505
15. McAllister, G., Irvine, J.J.: The role of empathy in teaching culturally diverse students.
Journal of Teacher Education, Vol. 53 No. 5, pp. 433-443 (2002).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/002248702237397
16. Park, B., Knörzer, L., Plass, J. L., Brünken, R.: Emotional design and positive emotions in
multimedia learning: An eyetracking study on the use of anthropomorphisms. Computers &
Education 86, 30-42 (2015). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2015.02.016
17. Heidig, S., Müller, J., Reichelt, M.: Emotional design in multimedia learning:
Differentiation on relevant design features and their effects on emotions and learning.
Computers in Human Behavior 44, 81-95 (2014).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2014.11.009
12
18. Kahu, E., Stephens, C., Leach, L., Zepke, N.: Linking academic emotions and student
engagement: mature-aged distance students’ transition to university. Promoting student
engagement and well-being 39(4), pp. 481-497 (2014).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0309877X.2014.895305
19. Tzacheva, A., Ranganathan, J., Jadi, R.: Multi-Label Emotion Mining From Student
Comments. The 2019 4th International Conference (2019).
https://doi.org/10.1145/3345094.3345112
20. Goebel, J., Maistry, S.: Recounting the role of emotions in learning economics: Using the
Threshold Concepts Framework to explore affective dimensions of students’ learning.
International Review of Economics Education 30:100145 (2019).
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iree.2018.08.001
21. Troop, M., White, D., Wilson, K. E., Zeni, P.: The User Experience Design for Learning
(UXDL) Framework: The Undergraduate Student Perspective. The Canadian Journal for the
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning 11(3) (2020). https://doi.org/10.5206/cjsotl-
rcacea.2020.3.8328
22. Rentzios, C., Kamtsios, S., Karagiannopoulou, E.: The Mediating Role of Implicit and
Explicit Emotion Regulation in the Relationship Between Academic Emotions and
Approaches to Learning Do Defense Styles Matter?. The Journal of nervous and mental
disease 207(8), pp. 683–692 (2019). http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/NMD.0000000000001027
23. Tan, A. H. T., Muskat, B., Johns R.: The role of empathy in the service experience. Journal
of Service Theory and Practice 29(1), pp. 142-164 (2019). http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/JSTP-
10-2018-0221
24. Kahu, E. R., Nelson K.: Student engagement in the educational interface: understanding the
mechanisms of student success. Higher Education Research & Development 37(4), pp. 1-14
(2017). http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2017.1344197
25. Young, E., Thompson, R., Sharp J., Bosmans, D.: Emotional transitions? Exploring the
student experience of entering higher education in a widening-participation HE-in-FE
setting. Journal of Further and Higher Education 44(10), pp. 1349-1363 (2019).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0309877X.2019.1688264
26. Kahu, E. R., Picton, C., Nelson, K.: Pathways to engagement: A longitudinal study of the
first-year student experience in the educational interface. Higher Education 79, pp. 657-673
(2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-019-00429-w
27. Cownie, F.: What drives students’ affective commitment towards their university?. Journal
of Further and Higher Education 43(5), pp. 674-691 (2017).
https://doi.org/10.1080/0309877X.2017.1394988
28. Parker, R.: Developing Software Engineers: A Study of Professionalization in a CS Senior
Capstone. The 49th ACM Technical Symposium of the Special Interest Group in Computer
Science Education (SIGCSE) (2018). https://doi.org/10.1145/3159450.3162326
29. Woo, K. S., Lam, S. K.: Measuring Service Quality: A test-retest reliability investigation of
SERVQUAL. Market Research Society 39(2), pp. 1–18 (1997).
https://doi.org/10.1177%2F147078539703900201
30. Carman, J. M.: Consumer perceptions of service quality: An assessment of the SERVQUAL
dimensions. Journal of Retailing 66(1), pp. 33–55 (1990).
31. Babakus, E., Boller, G. W.: An empirical assessment of the SERVQUAL scale. Journal of
Business Research 24(3), pp. 253-268 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1016/0148-2963(92)90022-
4