Thesis:

The effect of digital technologies on development and work thinking in male and female the first year high school students of Joghatai city in the academic year ۱۴۰۲-۱۴۰۳

The present study aimed to investigate the impact of digital technologies on academic thriving and career thinking among male and female lower secondary school students in Joghatai County during the academic year 2023–2024. Academic thriving, as a novel concept in learning psychology, reflects intrinsic motivation, self-leadership, interest in learning, and cognitive growth, whereas career thinking indicates a student’s future-oriented attitude towards professional life, responsibility, and skill-based mindset. Given the increasing role of digital technologies in educational settings, this research examined the relationship between the use of digital tools and these two educational-psychological variables. The research method was descriptive-correlational, based on structural equation modeling (SEM) using SmartPLS 3 software. The statistical population consisted of all male and female lower secondary school students in Joghatai, totaling approximately 1,200 students. Based on Cochran’s formula, a sample size of 300 students (150 girls and 150 boys) was selected through stratified random sampling. Data were collected using three questionnaires: a researcher-made digital technology questionnaire (22 items), a standard academic thriving questionnaire (24 items), and a career thinking questionnaire (24 items). The validity of the instruments was confirmed by expert judgment, and their reliability was established using Cronbach’s alpha and composite reliability (CR). Data were analyzed through SmartPLS. The results of the structural model analysis showed that digital technologies had a positive and significant effect on academic thriving (?=0.65, t=9.24, p<0.000) and also on career thinking (?=0.60, t=8.47, p<0.000). Moreover, the final model demonstrated a good fit (GOF=0.47). The coefficient of determination (R²) was 0.38 for academic thriving and 0.54 for career thinking, indicating a high explanatory power of the independent variable for the dependent variables. The findings highlight the importance of purposeful, educational, and healthy use of digital technologies in schools and recommend that educational policymakers, teachers, and parents utilize these technologies to foster academic self-motivation and career-oriented thinking among students.

Keywords: Digital technology, Academic thriving, Career thinking, Lower secondary education, SmartPLS, Male an