Teaching Business Statistics in a Computer Lab: Benefit or Distraction?

Teaching in a classroom configured with computers has been heralded as an aid to learning. Students receive the benefits of working with large data sets and real-world problems. However, with the advent of network and wireless connections, students can now use the computer for alternating tasks, such as emailing, web browsing, and social networking. Do these distractions diminish the benefits of the computers? An experiment was conducting comparing exam scores in two different classes, one class held in a traditional classroom and another class taught in a computer lab classroom. Holding constant other factors such as student's ability and demographics, the results show a small negative effect from conducting class in a computer equipped classroom.