ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Educ.
Sec. Higher Education
Development and validation of an instrument to assess the maturity of digital transformation in higher education institutions
Provisionally accepted
Carlos Valdivia-Salazar*
Oscar Serquén*
Laurita Guevara*
Jessie Bravo-Jaico
Roger Alarcón
Nilton Germán
Janet Aquino
Gisella Luisa Elena Maquen-Niño
Armando Moreno Heredia- National University Pedro Ruiz Gallo, Lambayeque, Peru
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The research defined the objective of building and validating instruments to assess the level of maturity of digital transformation in higher education institutions (HEIs). It was based on a theoretical-methodological model that specified eight dimensions of analysis. The methodology included 7 phases: contextualization of the instruments, initial proposal, iterative review and improvement, content validation, pilot test, reliability analysis and exploratory factor analysis (EFA). The results of the pilot test, conducted with more than 100 participants, showed adequate levels of reliability and validity. The EFA found an adjusted factorial structure of the instruments, with approximate factors of 59.7% for students, 64.8% for teachers, 72.79% for administrators and 81.9% for managers, being considered acceptable and suggesting that they effectively capture the dimensions of analysis. In addition, it was observed that some items originally assigned to specific dimensions were regrouped into conceptually related factors, suggesting the need for adjustments in the initial proposals. Based on the results obtained, these instruments have the potential to be effective tools for identifying digital maturity in HEIs, providing a comprehensive diagnosis to guide strategic decisions and technology investment planning for HEIs. Future studies could be complemented with the perception of graduates and the increase of the sample.
Keywords: construct and validate instrument, maturity level, digital transformation, exploratory factor analysis, Higher education institutions
Received: 23 Aug 2025; Accepted: 23 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Valdivia-Salazar, Serquén, Guevara, Bravo-Jaico, Alarcón, Germán, Aquino, Maquen-Niño and Moreno Heredia. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Carlos Valdivia-Salazar, cvaldivias@unprg.edu.pe
Oscar Serquén, aserquen@unprg.edu.pe
Laurita Guevara, lbguevara@unprg.edu.pe
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