The Impact of Language Proficiency on MOOC Performance: Insights From Video Interactions and Forum Participation

ABSTRACT Background Massive Open Online Courses or MOOCs have the potential to democratise education by making high‐quality learning opportunities accessible to students from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds and geographical locations. However, many courses on major platforms like EdX are offered exclusively in English, limiting accessibility for non‐native speakers. Beyond the simple native/non‐native divide, it remains unknown how different levels of English proficiency influence learners' performance in MOOCs. Objectives Our study investigates how language proficiency influences performance in English‐taught MOOCs and modulates the effect of participants' interactions with videos and discussion forums. Methods We retrieved the self‐assessed language proficiency from the pre‐ and post‐course surveys of 1268 participants for two MOOCs on EdX, viz., International Law and International Humanitarian Law. To capture these participants' interactions with videos and discussion forums, we generated measures of their use of pauses, closed captions, video playback rate, forum posts, etc. based on log data gathered automatically by EdX. Using mixed‐effects beta‐binomial regression, we relate these variables to their performance, calculated as the score they obtained on multiple‐choice questions throughout the course. Results and Conclusions In line with our expectations, interactions with discussion forums and especially videos have a positive effect on the performance of low‐proficiency participants, which could help them overcome the language barrier they face compared to more proficient and native participants. However, the majority of low‐proficiency participants do not make sufficient use of these video and discussion‐forum functionalities to fully benefit from their potential.