Perceptions and use of metaverse in higher education: A descriptive study in China and Spain

Abstract

The coronavirus disease – 2019 pandemic has accelerated the proliferation of virtual technologies and had have an enormous impact on education. In this paper, we analyse teachers’ perceptions about the use of the metaverse in educational practices and how it contributes to the local development. We focused our study in China and Spain as reference countries in the metaverse, but whose collaboration, in this arena, is not significant. For that purpose, we designed a questionnaire to explore the views of 20 teachers from each of the two universities selected, one in China and the other one in Spain, which applies an innovation and entrepreneurship education. The results show that the educational use of the metaverse is in its initial experimentation phase. Its application in innovation and entrepreneurship education is not limited to teachers' attitudes towards teaching, but rather to how the use of metaverse allows students to acquire real skills, which can contribute to the development of the society and improve international cooperation, thus creating a virtuous circle. Faculty training and university facilities remain limited for its implementation. Further research is needed on the data protection and privacy aspects on the practical educational use of metaverse.