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Effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in higher education: a particular case from the perspective of complex systems

The COVID-19 pandemic abruptly changed the classroom context, understood as the meeting space between teachers and students where a fundamental part of the construction of new knowledge takes place. This presented enormous challenges for all actors in the educational process, who had to overcome multiple difficulties and adapt to a new daily life in which the incorporation of new strategies and tools was essential. In this work we study the knowledge acquisition process in two different contexts: face-to-face (before the onset of the pandemic) and virtual (during confinement), for a particular case in higher education in Argentina. We developed an analytical model for the knowledge acquisition process, based on a series of surveys and information on academic performance. We analyzed the significance of the model by means of Artificial Neural Networks and a Multiple Linear Regression Method. We found that the virtual context produced a decrease in motivation to learn. We also found that the structure of the emerging contact network from peer interaction presents very different characteristics in both contexts. Finally, we show that in all cases, interaction with teachers is of utmost importance in the process of acquiring knowledge.