Received: 26 November 2017 | Accepted: 14 May 2018 DOI: 10.1002/cae.22000 SPECIAL ISSUE ARTICLE The effects of merging student emotion recognition with learning management systems on learners’ motivation and academic achievements Müzeyyen Bulut Özek Faculty of Education, Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technology, Firat University, Elazig, Turkey Correspondence Müzeyyen Bulut Özek, Faculty of Education, Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technology, Firat University, Elazig, Turkey. Email: muzeyyen_bulut@hotmail.com Abstract Technology diverts engineering education into learning management system for distance education activities. Learning management system facilitates the manage- ment of education and training process, including instructor-student, student-student, and student-content communication. Nevertheless, distance education has some disadvantages of not being able to establish active communication with students as in traditional education. This research offers a system which merges student emotion recognition with learning management system. This study aims to investigate the effects of merging student emotion recognition with learning management systems on learners’ motivation and academic achievements. In this research, the quasi- experimental design adopted 103 engineering students who were divided into three groups: the control group (participates in face-to-face education), the experimental group I (uses a system that merges emotion recognition with learning management system), and the experimental group II (uses learning management system). As a result of the research, it was found that the academic achievement and motivation of the experimental group I was significantly better than performance of the experimental II and the control group. KEYWORDS achievement, distance engineering education, emotion recognition, learning management system, motivation 1 | INTRODUCTION Rapid developments in communication and information technologies divert higher education institutions providing engineering education into distance education programs that offer students significant opportunities in addition to classical face-to-face education because it is difficult that educating of the future engineers who use the technology, by old methods [16]. However, there is a need for a platform that allows the teaching processes to be managed from a center in existing distance education programs. This need is satisfied by learning management systems (LMS). The LMS software interact with instructors, learners, and training materials, thanks to technological infrastructures. Educational activity in the virtual environment is the result of this interaction being achieved in a positive and efficient manner. LMS provide some functions such as presenting learning materials, sharing and discussing presented learning materials, managing course catalogs, taking assignments, entering exams, providing feedback on these assignments and exams, organizing learning materials, keeping students, instructors, and system records [20,21,23]. Comput Appl Eng Educ. 2018;1–11. wileyonlinelibrary.com/cae © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. | 1