To address institutional, staff and student needs, and embrace the digital world, university courses are utilising more online teaching platforms and embedded online tools. One such online tool, which allows for information sharing, the development of critical thinking and literature skills, and fostering interactions and networking, is the online discussion board. Online discussion boards can engage and educate students, and can be used as a potential platform through which to assess knowledge and understanding.
Although discussion boards are increasingly used in nursing there is limited understanding of how undergraduate students interact with these learning resources. This scoping review was conducted to explore undergraduate nursing students perceptions of online discussion boards. Using the Arksey and O'Malley's methodological framework, seven studies were identified, with different methodological paradigms and different outcomes. Results from these studies suggest that online discussion boards can be used to promote engagement, including enhancing learning and interactions; however, discussion boards can also promote student disengagement. Undergraduate student nurses may lack the technical skills to use discussion boards effectively or may reject them in preference for more traditional teaching and learning strategies. Enhancing undergraduate student nurses familiarity, and understanding of discussion boards is important to their success. Future research needs to explore how discussion boards contribute to teaching and learning and learner engagement in the undergraduate nursing curriculum.