The meta-analysis by Di Pietro and Muñoz (2025) investigated the impact of educational use of digital technologies has on less advantaged students’ achievement. A comprehensive definition is used for this group of students, which includes all students in less developed countries as well as more disadvantaged students in more developed countries. A total of 740 estimates from 72 studies employing experimental and quasi-experimental research designs are collected. The key moderating variables covered level of education, type of ed-tech intervention, geographical location, type of publication, publication year, subject area, thereby revealing both the overall impact of educational technology on disadvantaged students’ academic achievement and its differentiated effects.
Overall, educational technology initiatives are found to have a small, positive, statistically significant effect (Cohen’s d = 0.202) that remains even after correcting for publication bias. Moreover, computer-assisted learning and technology-enabled behavioral interventions lead to greater achievements than access-to-technology interventions. Insights from individual studies seem to indicate that pro-active text messages are more effective than informational text messages. Notably, the use of digital technologies is associated with slightly greater achievements in math and science than humanities. Larger impacts of ed-tech programmes tend to be reported in peer-reviewed journals than in other types of publication. However, achievement-enhancing effects of ed-tech programmes on students in less developed countries are not statistically different from those on more disadvantaged students in more developed countries.
Their results suggest that more needs be done to unleash the full potential of technology in boosting the achievement of less advantaged students. The provision of technology needs therefore to be accompanied by proper guidance and supervision to ensure that all students can harness the benefits of technology to improve their educational performance.
Source: Di Pietro, G., & Muñoz, J. C. (2025). A meta-analysis on the effect of technology on the achievement of less advantaged students. Computers & Education, 226, 105197. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2024.105197