Influence of gender of the teaching staff on students’ acceptance of a virtual implant planning course

Publication date: Available online 9 February 2017
Source:Journal of Cranio-Maxillofacial Surgery
Author(s): Emeka Nkenke, Elefterios Vairaktaris, Hans-Günter Schaller, Christos Perisanidis, Stephan Eitner
Acceptance of new technology is influenced by a number of situational and social factors. So far, only limited data are available on the influence of the teaching staff's gender on the acceptance of virtual dental implant planning by students. This study aimed at assessing the influence of the teaching staff's gender on the acceptance of a virtual implant planning course by male and female undergraduate dental students and their general attitude toward implantology.Two groups of third-year dental students (group 1, 9 males, 22 females; group 2, 12 males, 20 females) attended a virtual dental implant planning course. For the first group the teaching staff was all-male, while the teaching staff was all-female for the second group. After completion of the course the students filled in a technology acceptance questionnaire.An all-female teaching staff led to a degree of technology acceptance that did not differ significantly for male and female students. When the teaching staff was all-male, significant differences for technology acceptance occurred between male and female students.However, male as well as female students attributed the practice of implantology to both genders of dentists, equally, without statistically significant difference independent of the gender of the teaching staff.The more evenly distributed degree of technology acceptance of students of both genders being taught by a female staff is a favorable effect which may be explained by the more egalitarian style of women. Therefore, while feminization in dentistry proceeds, adequate measures should be taken to increase the number of female teachers.



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