Effects of Background Characteristics on Student Outcomes in a General English Blended Learning Course : Gender, Class Level, and Personality Type

In the context of General English courses, instructors face challenges in engaging diverse studentpopulations with varying background characteristics, such as gender, class level, and personality type.These factors can significantly influence student learning outcomes and engagement, yet prior studiesexamining their effects in online or Blended Learning (BL) environments have either shown limitedsignificance or produced conflicting results, resulting in an absence of clear conclusions on their role.This study aims to fill this gap by investigating how these background characteristics shape academicachievement, self-evaluation, peer evaluation, collaboration, and satisfaction in a BL course using a4-skills Discussion Board approach with student-created videos. A total of 81 students, separated intotwo treatment groups and one control group, participated in this study by creating student-created videos,evaluating their own and peers’ videos, and completing surveys as part of BL activities over the courseof a semester. The data were analyzed using factorial analysis of variance to examine the main effectsof gender, class level, and personality type. The findings reveal significant gender differences in academicachievement and collaboration, and class level differences in academic achievement, self-evaluation,and peer evaluations. No significant differences were found based on personality type. These resultssuggest that considering gender and class level when designing BL courses can enhance studentengagement and learning outcomes. Implications for course design and suggestions for future researchare discussed.