Dive Brief:

• Researchers publishing in a University of Chicago journal say that attendees of live lectures score between 2 and 3 points higher on exams than their online peers.
• The study was based on 215 students watching only online lectures and 97 who attended class in person.
• Some subsets showed bigger differences in outcomes, such as males and students from low socio-economic backgrounds.

Dive Insight:

The study is in the October edition of The Journal of Labor Economics. While the researchers say theirs is a rigorous test of the effects of live vs. online instruction, it was limited to students enrolled in a single microeconomics course at a large, selective university. With the number of MOOCs being offered every term growing into the hundreds — and with the style and types of MOOCs increasing — there is sure to be more data with every passing term.