Three paradoxes in the approach to educational technology in the education studies of the Spanish universities

The inadequacy of the informational

To start, the discoveries of neuroscience on the functioning of the human brain reveal that stories are much more effective than explicit information for motivating people (Keysers, 2011; Ramachandran, 2011; Salmon, 2008). This is assumed and applied by professionals of persuasive communication in all fields, from advertising and marketing to politics and business communication. Increasingly more people focus their communication strategies on the potential of storytelling (Heath & Heath, 2007; Lehrer, 2010; Salmon, 2008).

While discourse only activates the cerebral cortex (rational brain), stories activate the cortex by triggering the perceptive, motor and emotional systems in an integral way through mirror neurons (Ramachandran, 2011; Rizzolatti & Sinigaglia, 2006); hence, their motivating potential.

The paradox is that, in the academic world, the informational competence of students is focussed almost exclusively on their ability to search for, analyse, select, filter, contrast, organize, synthesize, use and communicate information, while persuasive communication professionals avoid using information and focus on stories and storytelling. In short, the new generations of citizens leave the educational environment without specific preparation for dealing with communication strategies that are increasingly present in the environment in which they move.

The inadequacy of the cognitive

The polarization of the academic world towards the cognitive aspects could be justified by arguing that students live a very intense emotional relationship with the technologies outside the classroom and that the objective of the education system is to counterbalance this by incorporating the rational, reflective dimension.

This seemingly reasonable argument crashes headlong with the more recent contributions of neuroscience in relation to brain functioning, especially from the point of view of the mental processes underlying decision-making.

Today it is known that the emotional brain is essential for the correct functioning of the rational brain: “Emotions are the foundation of everything we do, even reasoning” (Maturana & Bloch, 1998: 137). “Certain aspects of the process of emotion and feeling are indispensable for rationality” (Damasio, 1996: 10). “The limbic system (the emotional brain) is the brain’s power plant” (Carter, 2002: 54). Perhaps the most radical expression in this respect comes from Jonah Lehrer (2010): “Reason without emotion is impotent” (idem: 26). And even more emphatically: “If it weren’t for our emotions, reason wouldn’t exist at all” (Lehrer, 2010: 13).

The forcefulness of these quotes should lead university teachers to question whether the difficulties they encounter in obtaining rational attitudes and behaviours from students are not largely a consequence of their inability as educational professionals to elicit emotional responses from them.

The inadequacy of critical thinking

There is often criticism that the instrumental approach dominates the panorama of education technology. However, this happens because it is the most comfortable approach: Firstly because technology, being a material, specific and visible product, is easier to evaluate than an abstract and intangible process. Secondly, because its materiality becomes a result in itself: a classroom set up with screens and devices is a modern and innovative space per se. Thirdly, because the idea persists that technologies are neutral, and thus are subordinated to the use given to them, which puts them above any questioning, usually associated with resistance to change or little clarity about the specific advantages they offer beyond the initial novelty of their incorporation. As a recent article in The Economist (2017) notes: “education technology (edtech) has repeated the cycle of hype and flop, even as computers have reshaped almost every other part of life. One reason is the conservatism of teachers and their unions. But another is that the brain-stretching potential of edtech has remained unproven”.

From this comfortable approach “the processes of innovation through ICTs that have been implemented in university institutions have tended to focus on the translation of materials and tools into digital formats. That is to say, most curricular materials have been digitised without transforming the foundations of the dominant educational paradigm” (Gómez, 2014: 51). In this regard, Steven Johnson (2010) believes that innovation can only occur in an environment that facilitates relationships between people and diverse materials that can be explored and recombined. The university system, like the school system, is usually rigid, based on the principles of repetition and vertical control, and against risk or error, concepts outlawed from academic vocabulary. The projects to incorporate technologies in education therefore prefer the product to the process, with the aim of efficiency based on the transmission of contents.

Finally, Neuroscience experts implicitly highlight the shortcomings of the academic world when they affirm that “consciousness can only be understood by studying the unconscious processes that make it possible” (LeDoux, 1999: 32). Screens are an excellent opportunity to access the unconscious, a prerequisite for in-depth understanding (Keysers, 2011; Mlodinow, 2013; Van Praet, 2012).

The paradox of information

In 2006, with the appearance of the Organic Law of Education (LOE), digital competence became part of the prescriptive curriculum linked to the treatment of information. Digital literacy was structured from the outset around two central poles: the technological and the informational.

Already in 2001 the definition of digital literacy proposed by UNESCO referred to the set of skills, knowledge and attitudes that a person needs to be able to develop functionally within the Information Society. UNESCO followed experts who, at the end of the last century, expressed themselves along the same lines, demanding digital literacy “to enable students to understand and use information sources presented through computers” (Gilster, 1997: 6).

The academic world has readily accepted technologies as support for the Information and Knowledge Society and as an opportunity to enhance the information competence of citizens.

In this reductionist polarization of technology to information, it is forgotten that in people’s daily lives, entertainment and the relationships and interactions with others are as much or more important than the information. This is even more true for children and young people.

In the 50 articles on technological innovation analysed there are 1468 references to terms belonging to the semantic field of information. In contrast, there are only 253 references to the semantic field of entertainment. Only 17 of the 50 articles (34.00%) contain concepts related to entertainment, fun or leisure (a total of 49 references). These documents are linked to educational innovation, thus many of the educators intend to innovate by linking technology strictly to the informational. Terms related to stories and narrative (a total of 63 references) only appear in 12 of the 50 documents (24.00%), which implies that 76.00% of the authors make no reference at all to storytelling. Finally, 28 of the 50 articles (56.00%) contain concepts related to game, gamification and simulation (141 references). In this case the percentage is higher than the previous, but it is also important to highlight that 60 of the 141 references are included in just one document. Therefore, a single document incorporates 42.55% of these references.

In the 194 teaching guides of technology subjects in Spanish university education faculties there are 1817 references to terms linked to the semantic field of information, while there are only 189 references to terms linked to the semantic field of entertainment. Only 20 of the 194 teaching guides (10.31%) explicitly refer to the concepts of entertainment, fun or leisure (27 references), which means that 89.69% of the teachers who teach these subjects can be competent in the digital age without considering the dimension of entertainment.

The case of terms related to stories and narrative in the teaching guides follows a similar pattern to that of the articles and communications. There are only 102 references distributed in 42 of the 194 documents (21.65%), implying that 78.35% of authors do not include any technology teaching guidelines that reference storytelling. Finally, the case of terms related to game, gamification and simulation is similar to the previous ones. There are only 60 references distributed in 40 documents (20,62%).

The analysis of these documents shows that concepts such as gaming, gamification, simulation or virtual reality that connect with the sphere of the emotional and entertainment and that could contribute to enhance learning appear rarely, which agrees with the results of other studies around the Spanish university in which it is clear that the incorporation of these concepts is still in the minority and has significant gaps (Llorens-Largo et al., 2015; Peñalba, 2017).

Figure 1 illustrates the disproportion between the references to terms from the fields of information and entertainment. As it can be seen, references to entertainment are practically non-existent, given the low number found in the entire set of documents. In short, we speak of the informational paradox not only because this disproportion in academic attention between information and entertainment conflicts with people’s daily practices, and particularly those of children and young people, but also because of the relevance of persuasive and emotional strategies such storytelling presented at the beginning.

The paradox of the cognitive

In both the analysis of the 50 documents on educational innovation using technologies and in the 194 teaching guides of the technology-related subjects in Spanish education faculties, we discover a polarization towards the cognitive and rational, and a significant, if not total, marginalization of the emotional dimension.

In the 50 documents on educational innovation there are 2649 references to terms linked to the cognitive-rational semantic field and only 245 references to terms linked to the semantic field of emotion. There are only six explicit references to emotions, which means that 45 of the 50 documents (90%) do not make a single direct reference to emotions. It would seem that the aim is to innovate while totally marginalizing this dimension, intentionally or not.

In the entire set of articles and communications there are 80 references to motivation, but there are 18 documents (36%) that do not contain a single reference to this concept. Bearing in mind that these are texts focused on university educational innovation through technology, this lack is alarming, since the students’ motivations are a key aspect for learning.

In the 194 university teaching guides analysed, there are 6068 references to terms related to the cognitive-rational semantic field and only 396 references to terms related to the semantic field of emotion. There are only 78 direct references to emotions, and these are distributed among 41 guides (21.13%). Therefore, there are 153 teaching guides (78.87%) in which there is not a single reference to concepts related to emotions.

Regarding motivation, in the set of guides there are 33 references to motivation, but there are 169 documents (87.11%) that do not make a single reference to this concept. Being teaching guides for technology subjects, this absence is worrying, since almost 90% of the guides do not make any reference to the students’ motivations, a key aspect in the educational process.

Figure 2 confirms that the cognitive-rational field goes far beyond the emotional in the number of mentions. As the word cloud shows, the terms from the semantic field of emotion are barely visible.

The paradox of criticism

A further step in our research was aimed at detecting which conception of critical sense underlies the documents analysed. To achieve this, we analysed contextually with which noun the adjective “critical” was associated in each case. We were primarily interested in detecting whether the critical sense was related to the cognitive or the emotional. In other words, with thought or attitude.

In some cases the associated terms are ambiguous from this point of view. For example, when we talk about critical capacity, critical perspective, critical sense, critical awareness, and critical factors, among others. Or simply when critical is used as a noun: criticism, critics. In other cases the term is associated with concepts that are clearly cognitive: critical analysis, critical view, critical reading, critical understanding, critical reflection, critical evaluation, critical look, critical approach, and, above all, critical thinking. Finally, some associations can be related to the emotional: critical attitude, critical commitment, critical posture, critical use.

Of the 50 documents dealing with education technology innovation only 23 include the concept of critical (46%), and in these there are only 55 references to critical. Of these 55 references, most are associated with terms from the cognitive field and very few with the emotional field. For example, there is much talk about critical thinking or analysis (8 references) while there is not a single reference to “critical attitude”.

On the other hand, in 52 of the 194 teaching guides (26.80%) there is no reference to critical. And in the 142 guides (73.20%) where references do appear (a total of 613 references) these are polarized towards the cognitive field. If we combine the three most-used terms of the cognitive field (critical analysis, critical incorporation and critical vision) we obtain a total of 170 references. However, combining the three most-used terms in the emotional field (critical attitude, critical posture and critical use) we only obtain 37 references.

In Fig. 3 we can see the disproportion between the terms associated with critical. As in the previous clouds, we are working with articles, communications and teaching guides.

This lack is particularly serious in the light of statements by neuroscience experts: “Emotions create a fury of activity dedicated to a single goal. Thoughts, unless they activate the emotional mechanisms, do not do this” (LeDoux, 1999: 337).

Thoughts and knowledge do not motivate if they do not turn into feelings. Knowing that you are going to die 1 day does not impel you to review your life and your value system. You only do this when you have an accident or when a loved one dies; that is, when knowledge is accompanied by feelings.

Neurobiologist Donald Calne states that “the essential difference between reason and emotion is that while emotion leads to action, reason leads to drawing conclusions” (quoted by Roberts, 2005: 42). If we intend to achieve the transformation of the students, e critical thinking, critical understanding, critical reading or critical analysis should be just a step. The main objective of education should be a critical attitude, understanding attitude as a drive, an impulse, a willingness to act.

Of course, there can be no critical attitude without critical thinking, but critical thinking is insufficient if education is intended to enhance the personal autonomy and social commitment of citizens.

As already stated, in the set of 50 documents on educational innovation the concept of critical is referenced 55 times; however, in these references, self-criticism is referred to only twice. Similarly, in the set of 194 teaching guides the term critical appears 613 times, and only 16 of these refer to self-criticism.

These data reveal another significant lack in Spanish university education. If criticism is almost always only heterocritical (we must learn to criticize messages, products, information, and news, among others), it is because knowledge does not include self-knowledge. No account is taken of the great challenge already proposed by the Ancient Greek aphorism of the Delphic oracle considered the principle of wisdom: “know thyself.” In the Information and Knowledge Society, no attention is given to information and knowledge about oneself.

Every effort is made to take advantage of the screens as windows, as an opportunity to access the external reality, to accumulate information and knowledge about the world, and hardly any effort is made to take advantage of the possibilities of the screens as mirrors, as an opportunity to find yourself, and especially as an opportunity to access your own unconscious, the dark side of yourself, the most latent contradictions.

Limitations and further research

In this article, we have focused only on teaching guides and published work in the last years corresponding to education studies, therefore its results cannot be generalized to all higher education. Perhaps the polarization in the cognitive, the rational and the informative is not exclusive of the subjects or academic fields linked to technology exclusively, but a tendency of education in general. It would have to be confirmed in later investigations. Likewise, future work must integrate qualitative methodologies that allow a better understanding of the subjective view of the teachers who use educational technologies.