E-books in foreign language learning from the students' perspective: A review of research

Abstract

This paper looks at the use of e-books in higher education, with special reference to the perceptions of foreign language students, as over the last decade there has been a noticeable tendency in this population towards increased use of e-books for their studies. Due to their technical characteristics, primarily multimediality and interactivity, e-books have great potential for foreign language learning at all levels. Therefore, in the relevant literature there is an increasing number of studies dealing with various aspects of e-book use in foreign language acquisition. The aim of this paper is to present a review of published studies pertaining to student perceptions of the potential, advantages and drawbacks of e-books in content learning in the field of foreign languages. The structure of the paper comprises an introductory section, a section on the emergence of e-books, a review of research in higher education, and a review of studies in which data on foreign language students' perceptions of the use of e-books in their studies were obtained using empirical methods. In the conclusion, it is noted that students use e-books, that they are acquainted with their advantages and drawbacks, but that they nevertheless prefer the use of printed books for studying. Students' attitudes suggest that e-books, due to their technical characteristics, can have high applicability in foreign language learning in terms of vocabulary expansion, better comprehension, the development of reading habits and text analysis.