Fatma Salem Alzahrani^1,, Ammar Saleh Alshamrani¹

This study aimed to evaluate mobile usage and mobile learning (m-learning) amongst dental students for dental education at Taif University. The study comprised 51 dental students from the 1st, 2nd, 5th, and 6th years. Data were collected through an online google survey form and analyzed using Excel 2016 and SPSS 17.0. The questions were both quantitative and qualitative. The chi-square test was also applied to non-parametric questions for two independent variables, study year and gender, to evaluate mobile usage for m-learning. We found a significant association between the time duration of mobile usage and study year (P=.00) and gender (P=.00). There was also a significant association between the purposes of mobile usage with study year (P=.00) and gender (P=.02). Moreover, we found a significant association between preferences for mobile usage and study year (P=.00) and gender (P=.00). A total of 29% of the students use mobile devices for m-learning for more than 7 hours. A total of 78% of the students trust the reliability of mobile devices for m-learning. Most students use mobile devices (37%) more often than computers (6%). A total of 96% of dental students consider mobile devices as a medium for m-learning. Considering the results mentioned above, it was concluded that students have adapted to m-learning quickly as it is fast, convenient, and reliable. Mobile devices can also be used for numerous tasks and different purposes.

mobile learning, dental education, mobile usage, m-learning