The symbolic-cultural dimension of the digital transformation in HE. A comparative analysis

Abstract

European projects lend themselves to facing a comparative analysis through qualitative, quantitative,
or mixed methods. Among the various elements that organise the comparison, an important component
is the cultural dimension since it organises social actors’ practices, often carried out with qualitative
methods. However, in line with the literature, this dimension is detectable through text mining methods
since it determines the choice and association of the words used to organise communication. This work
proposes a text-mining procedure for comparing the documents’ symbolic-cultural categories, in line
with the theory of translation.
In particular, Emotional Text Mining was used to study the cultural differences in digital development
in Higher Education among countries through the analysis of the country partners’ report of the
Erasmus+ Project ECOLHE (Empower Competences for on life Learning in Higher Education1) to
identify the symbolic-cultural categories and the representations of digital development. Results have
important implications for identifying digital culture development indicators starting from texts, an
aspect that could be considered relevant for policymakers in the context of Erasmus+ projects.