Theorising Teacher Agency in Educational Technology Integration: A Grounded Theory Study in South South Nigerian Universities

This study develops a grounded theory of teacher agency in educational technology integration in South South Nigerian universities, contributing original theoretical knowledge to understanding how university lecturers exercise individual and collective agency in navigating institutional and contextual constraints on technology-enhanced teaching. Teacher agency in the technology integration literature has been predominantly theorised from Northern or East Asian higher education perspectives, and context-specific theorisation from West African universities is scarce. Classic Glaserian grounded theory methodology was employed, involving theoretical sampling of 60 lecturers from the University of Port Harcourt, Delta State University, and Cross River University of Technology across three iterative sampling rounds. Data collection included 60 semi-structured interviews and 25 theoretical memo-writing sessions. Constant comparative analysis was used throughout. The emergent core category, termed adaptive technological navigation, describes how lecturers exercise agency by creatively circumventing infrastructure deficits, domesticating externally developed platforms to suit local pedagogical styles, and building community-validated professional norms around technology use. The substantive theory positions agency as relational, iterative, and contextually anchored rather than individual and linear. The study's original contribution is a substantive grounded theory of teacher technology agency specific to resource-constrained African university contexts, with direct implications for faculty development policy and institutional leadership. Keywords: teacher agency, grounded theory, educational technology, South South Nigeria, university lecturers