Student information system satisfaction in higher education: the role of visual aesthetics

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore the role of visual aesthetics as a key in generating satisfaction in student information system (SIS) users and to discover relationships to other antecedents. This work has also studied how gender discriminates those relationships. Design/methodology/approach DeLone and McLean’s model of information systems success, visual aesthetic and gender socialisation theory are used as a theoretical framework for the study. An explanatory model was proposed based on the previous literature, and then this model was validated using a sample of undergraduate students. Partial Least Squares was chosen as the approach to conduct the statistical analysis. Findings First, the findings show that the variance explained by the proposed model in user satisfaction of SIS is 67 per cent. Second, visual aesthetics has a significant direct effect on user satisfaction of SIS, but the indirect effect is much higher, through its relationship to system quality and information quality. Third, the results indicate that there are significant differences between men and women in the direct relationship between visual aesthetics and user satisfaction of SIS, and this relationship being much more intense in the case of women. Originality/value The study highlights the role of visual aesthetics as a variable that explains user satisfaction in information systems; this fact emphasises on the importance of taking into account aesthetics when designing information systems. In addition, the findings support the existence of a novel relationship between visual aesthetics and information quality. Finally, new evidence on gender differences concerning user satisfaction in information systems is presented; this result indicates in the opposite direction to recent studies that imply a certain homogenisation of gender in relation to the perceptions associated with the technologies of the information.