Who Colonises Whom? Educational Technologies or Societal Cultures

Abstract

The literature records that educational technologies have the power to ‘colonise’ societal cultures. However, this study asserts the co-existence of a counter power through which societal cultures may ‘colonise’ educational technologies too. This assumption of power struggle is examined by addressing the question: to what extent do societal cultures colonise educational technologies? This question is answered using a qualitative and quantitative enquiry into Israeli society. Having analysed the data, it is found that societies consist of beliefs, attitudes and behaviours that may challenge the determination of educational technologies. This could be seen as empirical evidence suggesting that, although educational technologies may seek to colonise societies, societies may seek to colonise educational technologies as well, with the two entities engaging in a politically reciprocal relationship.

Introduction and Rationale

Fanon (2008) concludes his first volume with a religious lyric—‘O my body, make of me always a man who questions’ (p. 222). Viewing the surroundings through a questioning lens could be argued to be a precondition for innovation and thus growth (including academic growth; Seigel, 1968). Having subjected the existing literature to some questioning, it appears that academia has been mostly concerned with merely a singular reading and narrative of educational technologies, concentrating typically on the educational and the technological alone while turning a blind eye to the societal and the cultural. Such a singular reading lacks the interruption of what could be called ‘societal cultures’, that is, ‘socially derived, taken-for-granted assumptions about how to think and act’ (Kreitner, Kinicki & Cole, 2007, p. 301). Thus, the story is incomplete. Due emphasis has been put on the educational and the technological, but this has undue consequences, turning educational technologies into forces that are independent of societal cultures and intended to ‘colonise’ these cultures. Scholarship has yet to account for a counter-colonisation whereby societies want to determine and challenge education and technology with the intention of preserving, for example, ‘social and cultural capital’ (Bourdieu, 1986) and thereby ensuring that educational technologies are ‘tamed’ (Al Lily, 2012, p. 90) and remain within the existing ‘habitus’ (Bourdieu, 1977). There is therefore a need to conduct research examining how different societal cultures have been struggling to moderate educational technologies.

Considering that the field of educational technologies has had blurred boundaries and therefore is difficult to define (Ahmad, 1996; Daas, 2007), the phrase ‘educational technologies’ is used here to signify, simply, the area that lies at the intersection of the discipline of education and the discipline of technology (Ashteqa & Alayyan, 2010). Adding complexity to this endeavour is the fact that ‘educational technologies’ is an ambiguous label applied to this field of inquiry (cf. Al Lily & Foland, 2015). Rosenberg (2001) has stated that educational technology includes all forms of electronic pedagogy. This could encapsulate all forms of electronic media from simply digital text to web-based learning and video streaming; however, the practitioners of educational technology do not have a canon of defined terms which set the scope of their discipline (Al Lily & Foland, 2015). Essentially, educational technology is an ever-emerging discipline which adapts itself to whatever new technologies may be applied to education. The present authors do not believe that these should be confined to electronic or digital technologies. A discussion of such technologies is beyond the scope of this article; rather, this study explores the societal pressures which have manifested these technologies or have countered them.

For the current research, the Israeli context has been chosen as merely an instance. The present investigation seeks to address the research question: to what extent do societal cultures colonise educational technologies? The concept of ‘societal culture’ is used here to refer to the ‘unwritten set of norms and exceptions about how people should behave in a particular society’ (Birkinshaw & Mark, 2015, p. 34). The research qualitatively and quantitatively enquires into the way in which the societal culture of Israel has perhaps exerted influence on these technologies. The article first reviews the literature on this matter. It then explores the data collection and analysis methods being used. It then presents and discusses the results of the analytical process, finally summarising the study, presenting some concluding remarks, and making some recommendations for further research.

Literature Review

The literature documents the power of non-human elements to determine (i.e., ‘colonise’, in the terminology of Habermas, 1984, 1987) human elements (Ellul, 1964). This therefore implies that colonisation is not merely a matter of a human element (e.g., a human culture) extending control over another human element (i.e., another human culture). It is also a matter of non-human elements (here, educational technologies) extending control over human elements (here, over human cultures). Such ‘colonialism’, according to contemporary history, can be challenged academically by the notion of postcolonialism, the academic subject and intellectual dialogue intended to analyse, interpret, discuss and respond to the cultural legacies of colonialism (Young, 2003). In other words, the academic approach of postcolonialism is a suitable tool with which to analyse how educational technologies have colonised human cultures, including their beliefs, attitudes and behaviours. It would be useful to review the existing scholarship to discern how educational technologies have governed or arisen from the following aspects of humanity: beliefs, attitudes and behaviours. These three aspects form the traditional taxonomy in behavioural sciences (see, for example, Bhaskaran & Hardley, 2002; Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975). What follows first covers the political relationships between educational technologies and beliefs, then between educational technologies and attitudes, and eventually between educational technologies and behaviours.

On the relationship between educational technologies and beliefs, Fanon (2008) writes that the colonised follows the coloniser’s way of thinking. In other words, a society, being colonised by educational technologies, is more likely to follow the way of thinking that educational technologies promote. The technology-promoted way of thinking grants priority to three concepts of progress, rationality and efficiency. Various academic and social attempts have been made to promote progress facilitated by technologies (Crooke, 2004; Nef, 1934; Wight & Wagner, 1994). Likewise, technology-facilitated rationality has been discussed intensively (e.g., Cotgrove, 1975; Nordin, 1989; Staudenmaier, 2002). By the same token, the role of technologies in enhancing efficiency has been publicised (Humphrey & Pulley, 1997; Worthington & Lee, 2008). These attempts have become so integrated into human society that there has been a concern that such a society might turn, or even has already turned, into a ‘technological society’ (Ellul, 1964).

As for the relationship between educational technologies and attitudes, educational technologies have influenced collective and individual attitudes (Feenberg, 2003), with society being increasingly perceived as improving incrementally on a par with the incremental improvement of technology. There seems to be an academic domain that promotes the mechanisation of particularly education and educational institutions, with there being ‘ten steps to complex learning’ (Van Merriënboer & Kirschner, 2012), ‘ten steps to creating a corporate university’ (Meister, 2000) and the like. As for the relationship between educational technologies and behaviours, the human being, in theory, does not merely respond passively to physical and social stimuli; rather, ‘whenever he [sic] functions, by choice or by accident, he selects a particular niche, modifies it, develops ways to avoid what he does not want to perceive, and emphasises that which he wishes to experience’ (Dubos, 1970, p. 46). This turns the uses of educational technologies into intrinsically politically ‘messy and heterogeneous realities’ (in the language of Bijker & Law, 1992), opening up possibilities in which users behave ‘beyond, above or even against the primary intentions of their implementers’ (Al Lily, 2012, p. 45).

In this article, the assumption of power struggle between technology and culture is examined in an empirical study that aims to reveal the extent to which societal cultures can colonise educational technologies. This empirical question is answered using a qualitative and quantitative enquiry into Israeli society. Research has thus been conducted to examine the extent to which societies, through their belief systems, attitudes and behaviours, may challenge the determination of educational technologies. It should be noted again that this distinction of beliefs, attitudes and behaviours resonates with established psychological theories of behaviour (Webb & Sheeran, 2006), which typically describe behaviours as resulting from the interplay between psychological states known as beliefs and attitudes. The objective of the current study is to determine whether societies can influence educational technologies, which counterbalances the traditional view that educational technologies colonise societies, thus suggesting that these two entities may engage in a politically reciprocal relationship.

Methodology

The field research was carried out in 2014 for almost one year. The data were collected through a quantitative enquiry into the Israeli context, surveying 264 Jewish people (160 women and 104 men). However, the survey itself was developed initially based on qualitative research. That is, the questionnaire items were derived on the basis of formative research, carrying out four focus groups, each of which consisted of around fifty people and lasted almost one and a half hours, asking them about their primary societal and cultural concerns about educational technologies. Reviews of existing local publications (be they academic or non-academic) also helped with the generation of questionnaire items. Moreover, the authors are familiar with the context under investigation and therefore are experts in the beliefs, attitudes and behaviours that may challenge educational technologies in this context. Thus, the decision on what beliefs, attitudes and behaviours to include in the questionnaire was, following the advice of Horsburgh (2003), informed by the expertise of the authors and their inside knowledge on these contexts.

The qualitatively developed survey is divided into two quantitative parts. In the first part, the participant was asked to complete ‘objective’ demographic items that usually act as ‘independent variables’ or determinants of ‘subjective’ (psychological) states such as beliefs, attitudes and behaviours. In the second section, the participants were asked to complete items that specifically relate to each of those ‘subjective’ or cultural factors that the authors aimed to study (i.e., beliefs, attitudes and behaviours), which could also be construed as ‘dependent variables’. One of the strengths of the current research is that it enables cooperation between four authors who come from different social backgrounds and academic disciplines (education, sociology, politics/history and psychology). However, a key challenge is that, throughout the process of writing up the article, various insights and language forms—being informed by the four authors’ different academic disciplines and social backgrounds—were brought into consideration. The problem that arises is that those insights and terms might mean different concepts in those respective disciplines, which could result in confusion. For example, the results are written for a psychology journal, while the article begins and ends like political philosophy articles, and the methods and discussion are for an education journal.

‘Objective’ Demographic Factors

The first section of the questionnaire includes six independent, that is, demographic, items: (a) gender; (b) religiosity degree (all the participants come from a Jewish background); (c) marital status; (d) self-reported economic status; (e) travel to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia; and (f) study in North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia. The average age is 34.33 (11.47) years old. The researchers used personal contacts and referrals to solicit participation. The typical respondent was a married Jewish woman in her thirties, with a medium economic status, who had either sometimes or never travelled to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia and had not studied in these countries. A detailed breakdown of participants’ characteristics is given in Table 1.

‘Subjective’ Cultural Factors

The second part of the questionnaire is, as illustrated in Table 2, divided into three sub-sections. Sub-section 1, entitled Culturally Informed Negative Behaviour against Educational Technologies, measures different aspects that explain culturally informed negative reactions to educational technologies. Sub-section 2, entitled General Positive Attitude to Technology, measures the attitudes of people towards technologies in general. Sub-section 3, Strength in Conservative Belief, borrows the conservatism scale from Tybur and Inbar (submitted for publication) to measure the degree of conservatism among participants.

In sub-sections 1 and 2, participants rated on a seven-point scale from 0 (absolutely disagree) to 6 (absolutely agree) whether they would agree or disagree with the statements listed below. In section 3, participants answered ‘yes’ or ‘no’. The internal reliability of sub-section 1 is excellent (Cronbach alpha = 0.92), suggesting that the inter-correlations among the survey questions are well fitted to measuring the construct (i.e., in measuring different aspects that explain the culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies). The internal reliability measure of sub-section 2 is high too, with the Cronbach alpha being 0.73. This suggests that the inter-correlations among the survey items are reliable in terms of measuring the construct, that is, in measuring different aspects that explain the positive attitude towards technologies. Since the responses in sub-section 3 are given according to the yes/no scale, the Cronbach alpha could not be calculated and therefore the authors relied on the face validity of the scale.

Table 1

Demographics of Participants

Gender	Men	102	Economic Status	Low	43	Marital Status	Never Married	58
	Women	160		Medium	149		Married	183
				High	52		Divorced	15
Level of Religiosity	Not Religious	71	Travel to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia	No	110	Study in North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia	No	233
	Hardly Religious	57		A Few	66		Yes	24
	Medium Religious	51		Average	65
	Very Religious	82		A Lot	19

Source: Authors’ own.

Table 2

Questionnaire Items

Sub-section 1: Culturally Informed Negative Behaviour against Educational Technologies

I would not use any educational text, picture or video showing any erotic content.

I would not reveal my real full name on social networks such as web-based forums, Facebook and Twitter.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video showing women.

I would not use any educational product involving the female voice.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video supporting the idea of homosexuality.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video talking about sex education.

I would not display a photo of myself on social networks such as web-based forums, Facebook and Twitter.

I would cover the web-cam of my laptop or smartphone with tape.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video supporting the idea of women driving.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video displaying features of other religions, such as churches.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video displaying pigs.

I would not touch the holy book unless I have washed myself.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video displaying alcohol.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video talking about music education.

I would not use any educational text, picture or video teaching dancing.

Sub-section 2: General Positive Attitude towards Technology

Technology is important for education.

I love technological innovations.

I like to use the Internet on a daily basis.

Technology must be used if it does not contradict moral values.

Sub-section 3: Strength in Conservative Belief

I believe that climate change is a very serious problem.

I believe that society should accept homosexuality.

I believe that it is morally acceptable for adults to use drugs recreationally.

I believe that my country should be more open to immigrants.

I believe that society should increase its use of nuclear power.

I am in favour of my organs being donated to others after I die.

Source: Authors’ own.

The list of questionnaire items is not exhaustive, in the sense that there are obviously missing items given the myriad cultural values and practices in these complex societies. Thus, owing to the limit on the number of questionnaire items that could be reliably administered and that our respondents would willingly answer, the study focused on discerning ‘typical’ societal and cultural barriers to educationally oriented technological innovation, thereby providing a ‘proof of concept’—namely, that culture likely shapes the uptake of educational technologies. The purpose of this proof-of-concept approach is to verify the impact of social influences on technologies and their potential to be used in the field of educational technologies and in the context of Israel.

Results

The collected data were analysed using two analytical techniques. The first technique is path analysis to identify the direct and indirect predictors of each variable. Path analysis is generally used to provide estimates of the magnitude and significance of hypothesised causal connections between sets of variables. Since this research aims to highlight direct and indirect predictor of variables, path analysis was seen to be appropriate for this research. The second technique is a Z-scores calculation to identify whether the mean of each scale varies according to demographic variables. Z-Score is generally used to examine the extent to which the mean of a scale varies in line with independent variables. Since this research aims to examine whether the mean of some scale varies according to some demographic variables, Z-scores calculations were seen to be suitable here. Z-scores were used because they better describe the place of the raw score in the distribution, indicating whether a particular value (measurement) is above or below the mean and by how many standard deviations.

Using the Technique of Path Analysis to Identify the Direct and Indirect Predictors of Each Variable

As stated, six objective demographic (independent) variables have been isolated (gender, religiosity, marital status, economic status, travel experience and study experience) as well as three subjective cultural (dependent) variables (the Culturally Informed Negative Behaviour against Educational Technologies scale, the Positive Attitude to Technologies scale and the Strength in Conservative Belief scale). In order to capture and illustrate the influential relationships among these objective and subjective (dependent and independent) variables, the technique of ‘path analysis’ (Wright, 1921) was used. The strength of this technique is that it allows simultaneous multivariate analysis of the relationships between exogenous and endogenous variables and the covariance among the exogenous variables. In this study, the path models for all three scales and demographic variables were dependently analysed, and Figure 1 was produced. The single-headed arrows in this figure show a one-way relationship between elements, whereas the double-headed arrows indicate covariance between components. If the number next to the arrow is ‘plus’, this speaks of a positive relationship. If it is ‘minus’, it shows a negative relationship. Thus, this model shows the causal mechanisms through which the variables produce both direct and indirect effects on one another.

In Figure 1, all the arrows show significant relationships. This figure shows three different types of predictors. One is a direct predictor, with the degree of religiosity (i.e., how Jewish one sees oneself as) having a significant impact on the positive attitude towards technology. The second type of predictor is an indirect predictor that exerts influence on a predictor through another predictor. For example, the degree of religiosity influences culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies, which in turn influences attitude towards technology. The third type of predictor is an indirect predictor that influences another predictor that in turn influences an additional predictor through another predictor. That is, an entity may influence another entity through two other entities. For example, the level of religiosity influences the strength in conservative belief, which then influences the culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies, which then influence the attitude towards technologies.

Figure 1

Source: Authors’ own.

What can be seen here is that there might never be such a thing as an ‘objective’ or ‘independent’ variable. All items and aspects of life might perhaps, as suggested by the current research, be somehow dependent in one way or another. No item or aspect only influences and never gets influenced by other items or aspects. So-called independency might thus be a myth; dependency might be argued to exist as an unavoidable limitation of humanity. The approach of actor network theory shows how humans and even non-humans act in a network of dependency, to be specific, ‘interdependency’. This makes any investigation into any aspect of social life, including educational technologies, very analytically complicated. Moreover, what can be seen in Figure 1 is the strong role played by religion in Israeli society, which influences the strength of one’s conservative belief, which then influences one’s general positive attitude towards technology, which then influences one’s culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies. Thus, it would not be politically wise for policy-makers in the Israeli context to make decisions on educational technologies without careful consideration of religious values and thus the wider societal culture.

Of course, the obvious limitations of the current survey pool raise a number of problems. For example, it is difficult to confidently make generalising claims beyond the survey group. Hence, only suggestions could be proffered. The survey has been restricted to reflect a population that adheres to Judaism and that may not adhere to any other religion. Moreover, the current study lacks a control group or comparative pool of participants who do not adhere to Judaism. A similar survey, presented to non-Jewish participants, may reveal completely different results. Another limitation is that the survey did not ask participants themselves if they were conscious of a link between the study’s six ‘independent’ demographic variables and support of new educational technologies. It has, instead, attempted to mine their survey responses.

Using the Z-scores Calculation to Identify whether the Mean of Each Scale Varies According to Demographic Variables

In order to analyse how each ‘objective’ demographic variable varies according to the groups within each ‘subjective’ cultural variable, the Z-score is calculated, resulting in Table 3. The total mean of the Z-score equals 0.

Table 3 suggests that, in Israel, if the degree of how Jewish one is increases, the strength of one’s conservative beliefs also increases. Similarly, it seems from the table that the more Jewish one becomes in this country, the more resistant one may become to educational technologies that challenge cultural norms. In the Israeli context, the more Jewish an individual is, the less positive that individual’s attitude towards technologies. This shows the considerable influence of Judaism in Israel on technology in general and on educational technologies in particular. This brings up two issues. One is that some aspects of a societal culture (here, Judaism) may shape acceptance of educational technologies. The other issue is whether it is only Judaism in Israel that influences educational technologies, or whether Judaism in any other country also shapes such technologies. Moreover, one might wonder if it is only the religion of Judaism that considerably influences educational technologies, or whether other religions also challenge educational technologies. The argument that the current study promotes is that some components of a societal culture (here, religion) may play a role in shaping educational technologies. Indeed, further research is needed to examine the influence of Judaism on educational technologies in a non-Israeli context and to look into the influence of other religions on such technologies. There is a clear suggestion that policies should not be made on educational technologies before cautious consideration of the influence of religions on the acceptance of these technologies.

Table 3

Identifying How the Mean of Each Scale Varies According to Demographic Variables

Religiosity Level	Culturally Informed Negative Behaviour against Educational Technologies	Positive Attitude towards Technology	Strength in Conservative Belief
Not Religious (N = 71)	–0.67	0.42	–0.64
Hardly Religious (N = 57)	–0.22	0.31	–0.11
Medium Religious (N = 51)	0.08	0.11	0.09
Very Religious (N = 82)	0.70	–0.69	0.58
Gender
Men (N = 101)	0.00	0.05	–0.05
Women (N = 159)	0.00	–0.03	0.02
Age
Less Than 20 (N = 15)	0.03	–0.63	–0.06
Between 20 and 29 (N = 105)	–0.07	0.01	0.04
Between 30 and 39 (N = 76)	0.09	–0.12	–0.10
Between 40 and 49 (N = 40)	–0.06	0.28	–0.07
Between 50 and 59 (N = 18)	0.18	0.22	0.38
60 and More (N = 6)	0.04	0.32	–0.22
Marital Status
Never Married (N = 61)	–0.35	0.07	–0.37
Married (N = 181)	0.10	–0.01	0.10
Divorced (N = 15)	0.09	–0.21	0.09
Travel to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia
No (N = 110)	0.28	–0.19	0.18
A Few (N = 65)	–0.02	0.04	0.08
Medium (N = 64)	–0.38	0.25	–0.28
A Lot (N = 19)	–0.43	0.25	–0.52

Source: Authors’ own.

What Table 3 also suggests is that, in Israel, one’s gender plays no significant role in how conservative one is. In addition, one’s gender plays no significant role in one’s positive attitude towards technology and no significant role in one’s culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies. Thus, a societally oriented cultural configuration (here, gender) does not play a role in Israeli society in terms of influencing technology in general and educational technologies in particular. In other words, although some aspects of a societal culture (here, the degree of religiosity, as shown in the previous paragraph) may exert a significant influence on educational technologies, other aspects (here, gender) may not have any impact on such technologies. It should be made clear that this is not to say that one’s gender does not play a role in shaping educational technology in all contexts but rather that it does not, as the current study suggests, play a role in the Israeli context. Thus, there is a need for further research to investigate if this lack of influence exerted by gender on educational technologies exists in other contexts or is merely specific to the Israeli context. Moreover, further research is needed to examine why there is no influence exerted by gender on educational technologies in the Israeli context. One might wonder if this is because educational technologies have managed to deactivate the political power of gender or because educational technologies exist as gender-free. There are actually a number of findings which are as yet unknown to be unique to the Israeli case study or universal. For example, the lack of correlation between gender and either positive or negative attitudes to educational technologies may have arisen from the relatively liberal attitude towards female education in Israel; however, this attitude is certainly not unique to Israel, nor is it a constant in Israeli history. A historical comparison or a comparison with another locale may yield drastically dissimilar results if that time period or region does not exhibit equal degrees of freedom for both genders.

Table 3 suggests that, in Israel, as long as one is single, the strength of one’s conservative beliefs is likely to be low. Yet once an individual gets married, there is accordingly a statistically higher likelihood that the strength of his or her conservative beliefs goes up. The strength of these conservative beliefs is more likely to remain as it is when he or she becomes divorced. Likewise, as long as one is single, the strength of one’s culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies is low. Yet when one is married, the strength of one’s culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies is likely to go up. The strength of his or her culturally informed negative reaction to educational technologies remains as it is even after divorce. This could be seen as primary evidence that the Israeli experience of being married is essential, influencing one’s conservative belief and even one’s culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies. This, again, shows how the societal and cultural arrangement of one’s life can have some bearing on educational technologies. On the other hand, this is merely a statistical correlation: further research is needed on the reasons why marriage in the Israeli context appears to change one’s culturally informed negative reaction to educational technologies.

It seems from Table 3 that the experience of having travelled to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia is essential in the Israeli context. The more one has travelled to these countries, the less conservative one becomes. Likewise, the more experience one has of these nations, the less one resists educational technologies if these technologies do not go against the societally informed cultural configuration of one’s own country.. Similarly, if one takes a trip to these places, one is more likely to have positive attitudes towards technology. This could suggest that, although the experience of travelling to these countries has nothing to do with educational technologies per se (i.e., has nothing to do with education or technology in itself), it can influence these technologies. This promotes the argument of Selwyn (2011) that there are non-educational and non-technological factors that influence educational technologies. In other words, the societal, cultural (and indeed economic and political) aspects of educational technologies should be subject to research by scholars of educational technologies, just as much as the educational and technological aspects of educational technologies have been subject to research.

Discussion

The present research could be said to come under the umbrella of ‘the sociology of technology’ (Mackay & Gillespie, 1992), concentrating on what could be called ‘the sociology of educational technologies’. It has developed a critique of the notion of ‘technological determinism’ (Bimber, 1994), promoting the existence of a two-way political relationship between technologies and societies. It has examined the assumption that, although educational technologies have the power to ‘colonise’ societies, there could be a neutralising power through which societies themselves can ‘colonise’ educational technologies. This assumption has been examined qualitatively and quantitatively by addressing the research question: to what extent do societal cultures colonise educational technologies? The qualitative research (through focus groups) has helped identify six independent variables and three dependent variables. The ‘objective’ demographic variables are:

Gender

Degree of religiosity

Marital status

Self-reported economic status

Travel to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia

Study in these countries

The ‘subjective’ cultural variables are:

Beliefs (i.e., conservative beliefs)

Attitudes (i.e., positive attitude towards technologies)

Behaviours (i.e., culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies)

The quantitative research through a questionnaire helped us to analyse the significant interactions among independent and dependent variables. This analysis has involved the utilisation of two complementary analytical techniques. The first technique is ‘path analysis’, which has helped to identify the direct and indirect predictors of each variable. These predictors are:

Direct Predictor

Level of Religiosity → positive attitude towards technologies

Indirect Predictors (that exert influence through one entity)

Level of Religiosity → culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies → positive attitude towards technologies

Travel to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia → culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies → positive attitude towards technologies

Doubly Indirect Predictor (that exerts influence through two entities)

Level of Religiosity → strength in conservative beliefs → culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies → positive attitude towards technologies.

The second technique is the Z-scores calculation, which has helped to identify the mean of each scale according to demographic variables. The outcomes of this calculation are:

Level of Religiosity

In our sample taken from Israel, if the level of religiosity goes up (↑), the strength in conservative beliefs goes up too (↑)

In our sample taken from Israel, if the level of religiosity goes up (↑), the culturally informed negative reaction towards educational technologies goes up too (↑)

In our sample taken from Israel, if the level of religiosity goes up (↑), the positive attitude towards technologies goes down (↓)

Age

In our sample taken from Israel, as one grows older (↑), the positive attitude towards technologies goes up (↑)

Marital Status

In our sample taken from Israel, if one is single, the strength in conservative beliefs is down (↓)

In our sample taken from Israel, if one is single, culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies goes down (↓)

Travel to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia

In our sample taken from Israel, if one travels more to these countries (↑), the strength in conservative beliefs goes down (↓)

In our sample taken from Israel, if one travels more to these countries (↑), culturally informed negative behaviour against educational technologies goes down (↓)

The results of these two analytical techniques confirm the initial assumption that societies, through their beliefs, attitudes and behaviours, can challenge the determination of educational technologies. This means that, although educational technologies may take possession of cultural societies, cultural societies may also take over educational technologies, with the two entities engaging in a politically reciprocal relationship. This relationship is politically striking. Educational technologies are not ‘aliens’ in a society; rather, they arise from within societies or they are consciously imported into them. Nevertheless, once a technology is released into a population, societies may struggle to determine the nature and limits of their own technologies. Once educational technologies appear to ‘take on a life of their own’ (Silverstone, 2005, p. 229) and become ‘lived cultures’ (Balnaves & Caputi, 2001, p. 4), they may start to determine not only societies (i.e., their own ‘masters’) but moreover other technologies. In this respect, educational technologies colonise their ‘fellow’ educational technologies. Thus, instead of overlooking societal and cultural values during technological developments in educational settings, such values must be given recognition and political weight by policy-makers and researchers. However, it must be noted that there seems to be a striking difference between local and global technologies and between invented and imported technologies. The current survey material does not distinguish between those educational technologies that have arisen in the Israeli context and those imported from abroad. The importation of educational technologies is another facet of the coloniser/colonised relationship that requires further research. Locals who are reluctant to import foreign technologies may actually be more prone to endorsing locally created educational technologies. This form of localised modification can be seen in other contexts (see, for example, Al Lily, 2012). Future research on localised contexts in comparison to the current one would be academically beneficial. Besides, further research should conduct one-to-one interviews to support (or challenge) the results of the current study.

The collected data raise several concerns. One such concern is that, with the increasing strength in the domination and political marketing of educational technologies and the ongoing transformation into a ‘technological society’ (Ellul, 1964), future human societies may end up becoming merely politically submissive and passive, having the ability to only sit back and watch how educational technologies influence themselves, being independent and determinant of human political agency. This passivity is more likely to occur when societal cultures are not well enriched and when cultural societies hold an innocent faith in educational technologies, enabling these technologies to take the lead in a society’s educational life. The societal culture of Israel could be said to be well enriched and well maintained, and hence this culture defensively exerts a greater influence on educational technologies. In a different mode of interpretation, educational technologies might exert more influence on a societal culture that is not well protected and not well enriched, and which may be more amenable to importing or inventing new educational technologies whenever they are needed without fully analysing the social and cultural impact that may arise from these technologies. Again, Israel is a remarkable instance because it differs from many ‘Western’ countries in the sense that its political identity is reflected in its cultural identity and vice versa.

Another concern is that, although philosophers have for centuries pondered the difficulties involved in isolating the causes of effects and while statisticians have had more success by focusing on measuring the effects of causes (Wainer, 2010), educational technologies have come to destabilise this cause–effect inference, with such technologies at times acting as effects and at other times as causes. Moreover, such technologies can act as effects at a particular time and in particular place and as causes in another. Hence, there is a need to relocate the current research in contexts that are different from the current one (i.e., the Israeli context) and in a time different from the current time (i.e., the middle of the second decade of the twenty-first century) so as to examine the assumption that educational technologies can play different roles (as influencer and influenced) based on spatial and temporal configurations. A comparative study is welcomed on societies exhibiting similar or different pools of respondents. Moreover, a historical comparison can be employed: a further study may mine social and cultural literature from any point in Israeli history to determine if key events affected attitudes towards educational technologies.

Some might contend that educational technologies do not function independently of local conditions, as local conditions may adapt, reject or modify educational technologies based on a number of culturally driven considerations. Likewise, the impact of these technologies on societies and cultures is neither static nor universal. Therefore, the current discussion of perspectives only reflects the ongoing relationships in the current small pool of Israeli respondents, although a comparison with other Israeli and non-Israeli pools is sure to garner fruitful results. One might argue that, at first glance, many of the researched variables and their effects seem obvious and universal: for example, that travelling abroad to North America, Europe, New Zealand or Australia would inevitably increase one’s willingness to accept educational technologies. After all, such locales are commonly associated with the genesis and implementation of new technologies and not commonly associated with resistance to technologies. However, correlation does not imply causation. One cannot definitively conclude that the proposed variables of the study increase or do not increase positive attitudes towards educational technologies. The collected data merely suggest that this is so; however, the data do not take into consideration a myriad of other independent variables that may or may not have otherwise increased the positive attitude towards educational technologies. These include, for example, further independent variables relating to family background, cultural tastes, philosophy, personal experiences or personal interactions with foreigners prior to travelling abroad.

Concluding Remarks

What the current study has shown is confined to the Israeli context, showing how Israeli culture has influenced educational technologies. Nevertheless, ‘although we need to see the context, we also need to lift our perceptions to see its global message’ (Fanon, 2008, p. 184). The global and ‘take-home’ message from the current study is that, although educational technologies have the power to determine (i.e., to ‘colonise’) societies and may appear as if they are deaf to the political condition of the colonised and to what the colonised has to say, there could be, on the other hand, a counter power (be it explicit or implicit) through which societies can determine (i.e., ‘colonise’) educational technologies.

In terms of who colonises whom in a broader context, a concern is that, with the increasing strength in technology-promoted progress, rationality and efficiency, more and more people might start (or have already started) to consider or realise that educational technologies can be blind and deaf to social needs (Alenezi, Global Conference on Education, 2014). That is, technology can be blind in the sense that it can have no sense of direction, hitting and therefore changing whatever societal culture into which it runs. It can also be deaf in the sense that it may not hear and therefore follow voices (even loud voices), having its own self-control that is informed by progress, rationality and efficiency alone. Yet the present study has suggested that societal cultures may not necessarily accept educational technologies as entities that are blind and deaf to their needs, or rather they may see them as entities that are be to be challenged when they go against their societal and cultural values. This suggestion has arisen from the present analysis of societal culture in Israel; the authors now call for further investigations into other locales, time periods and national contexts.

If one were to assume that educational technology is a ‘Westernising’ or ‘colonising’ force, then we may surmise that it subverts local non-Western technologies and undermines local social attitudes which are not amenable to utilise these foreign technologies or educational techniques. If this were to follow Fanon’s view of a colonial force, Westernising educational technologies are promoted as the ‘correct’ tools by both foreigners and local elites who wish to emulate them and abandon the ‘wrongness’ of local educational technologies and traditions (Fanon, 2008). Although educational technologies may appear to be apolitical or exist in a purely academic vacuum, more and more people might start (or have already started) to consider that educational technologies can, as mentioned above, be blind and deaf to local social needs.

The intensive daily social exposure to technology and ‘the seamless integration of technology into everyday life’ (Denning, 2001) is perhaps making technology an integral part of social culture, that is, integral part of the ‘unwritten set of norms and exceptions about how people should behave’ (Birkinshaw & Mark, 2015, p. 34). In this case, human society is perhaps turning out to be a complex mixture of culture-oriented and technology-oriented values to a degree that makes it difficult to distinguish between ‘the culture-oriented’ and ‘the technology-oriented’ (Al Lily, 2011; Al Lily & Foland, 2015; Cotton, 2015). This is when we cannot figure out whether technology is a reflection of us, or we are a reflection of technology.

In the wider context, some non-Western educational institutions are currently undergoing a dramatic shift towards emulating Western pedagogical techniques. Whereas a traditional colonial force might found new colonial schools or universities which are modelled on Western institutes; postcolonial societies and administrators have rejected the colonial model of dominance, yet are still prone to benchmark their local institutes on Western schools and universities. It is unlikely that this process takes into account local demographic conditions and societal norms which cannot accept or implement Western educational technologies. As these local societies will adapt educational technologies to suit their local demographics, they themselves may colonise the field of educational technology: employing technologies in a way that has yet to be developed, adopting new technologies, or rejecting certain technologies which are part of the standard collection of educational tools.

Adjusting the current study to suit other demographics will certainly yield interesting comparative results. In particular, examining populations that more closely fit the mould of the ‘colonised’ may exhibit different attitudes towards foreign ‘colonising’ educational technologies. A comparison of the Israeli context to other locations in the Levant, North Africa and elsewhere in the Middle East could be said to take into account the legacy of European colonisation in these areas and the long-term ramifications of their attempts to implement ‘Western’ forms of education and technology (Al Lily, 2013; Mehana, 2009). In other locales, such as former European colonial possessions, anti-colonial sentiments may also play a greater role in shaping modern attitudes towards imported technologies, as well as differing religious and gender norms. The authors cannot, as yet, say whether these postcolonial attitudes will exhibit a positive or negative attitude towards educational technologies.

The contribution of the current study could be seen in four strong points. One is that it narrows the wide scope that the generic theory of ‘the social shaping of technologies’ (Williams & Edge, 1996a, 1996b) covers, concentrating particularly on only the cultural component of society and therefore promoting a new concept that could be called ‘the culturally oriented social shaping of technologies’. Another strong point is that the present study helps introduce this concept into the historically ‘young’ field of educational technologies, promoting the idea of the ‘culturally oriented social shaping of educational technologies’. An additional strong point is that the current research promotes this idea particularly in the academic and social context of Israel, enquiring into how Israeli society, being informed by its own culture, may influence educational technologies. However, we need a much larger sample and multisource data and analysis to extend this argument. The last strong point is that the current enquiry adds a complementary point to the notion of ‘the social shaping of educational technologies’, promoting the idea of ‘the individual shaping of educational technologies’ wherein individuals, beyond the collective political power of wider society, hold a form of political power that they may choose to activate in order to challenge educational technologies.

The present study seeks to modify the approach of current scholarship towards the role of educational technologies. It appears that educational technologies have typically been academically assumed to be politically uncontested, instead of being analysed as something often challenged by the affected public. In an era such as ours, which is increasingly technologised and dominated by the concept of scientism, there has seemingly become increasingly limited space for societal–cultural sensitivity that challenges any given and science-driven educational technologies (Fanon, 1992). Thus, there is, as the current study has shown, a need for ongoing research that subjects educational technologies to societal–cultural sensitivity. Besides, the community of educational technology scholars apparently tends to commonly analyse the passive and thus apolitical response of human beliefs, attitudes and behaviours to educational technologies, not the active and thus political beliefs, attitudes and behaviours wherein humans challenge educational technologies. This is conceivably because this community, at least subconsciously, promotes the idea that educational technologies impose a generic model, into which existing societal cultures must fit themselves. Thus, cultural societies in this respect are perceived not as real entities with real histories but rather as eventually merely reflections of technology-driven images. Yet cultural societies are, as the current study has suggested, essentially, organisations that are collections of individuals and that ‘create a complex and unpredictable web of values, interests and power and not reified entities’ (Stream, Rostis & Mills, 2009, p. 3), which educational technologies have to encounter once (or even before) they are put ‘on the ground’. Thus, cultural societies must be given the chance to rise above the technological drama and scenarios that have been staged around them.

The aim (i.e., end) of education appears to be agreed upon, that is, to eventually have educated ‘characters’ (Jeffreys, 1955, p. 13). In such a case, the only questions left are those of means (e.g., technologies, i.e., the so-called educational technologies). As Berlin (1958) put it, ‘where ends are agreed, the only questions left are those of means’ (p. 116). Although it seems easy to have agreement over the end of education, it is apparently almost impossible to reach agreement over its means, since means are influenced by politics and the construction of them is a political act (Winner, 1986). Considering the increasing strength in the ‘technologisation of educational means’ (Al Lily, 2008, p. 87), a concern is that educational means become technologised and turn into objects (i.e., the so-called educational technologies). Yet since means can be influenced by political values, the technologised educational means that are produced can be merely entities into which political values are built and thus technologised. Once political values are built into educational technologies, they take a solid shape and enter education under the name of education. That is, educational and political values appear identical, with political values wearing ‘the mask of education’ (to borrow a term from Thaker, 2012). Thus, those political values being built into educational technologies can go into education as if they are educational values. With the passage of time, these political values ‘settle down’ in educational settings and get passed on from one generation to another, framing the educational life and activity of generations. This is indeed a warning for those who put their faith in educational technologies. Educational technologies are supposed to be constructed to serve only education; however, in reality, educational technologies can, as the current study has shown, be constructed to serve education with the proviso that they do not clash with societal cultures. This is where politics play a role. Political values can intervene in education to ensure that the educational activity and its tools remain within and do not cross the existing boundaries of the wider societal culture.

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