Learning style

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Definition

According to Wikipedia: “Learning styles are different ways that a person can learn. It's commonly believed that most people favor some particular method of interacting with, taking in, and processing stimuli or information. Psychologists have proposed several complementary taxonomies of learning styles. But other psychologists and neuroscientists have questioned the scientific basis for some learning style theories. A major report published in 2004 cast doubt on most of the main tests used to identify an individual's learning style.”

Here are a few definitions found in Internet glossaries:

  • The manner in which a learner perceives, interacts with, and responds to the learning environment. Components of learning style are the cognitive, affective and physiological elements, all of which may be strongly influenced by a person's cultural background. [1]
  • A preferential mode, through which a subject likes to master learning, solve problems, thinks or simply react in a pedagogical situation. [2]
  • A consistent pattern of behavior and performance by which an individual approaches educational experiences; learning style is derived from cultural socialization and individual personality as well as from the broader influence of human development. [3]
  • Learning styles can be defined as a set of cognitive, emotional, characteristic and physiological factors that serve as relatively stable indicators of how a learner perceives, interacts with, and responds to the learning environment (Keefe, 1979) accoring to [4]

Note that learning styles are related to cognitive styles (ways in which we think).

Typologies

Acharaya (2002)suggests that many theories of learning styles can be condensed and examined in four dimensions as follows:

  1. Personality of the Learners
    • Field dependence/independence, i.e. some look at patterns or relationships between parts first before looking at the at a whole picture / some look at the whole picture first and isolate or break it down into smaller parts after (Witkin & Goodenough, 1981)
    • Impulsive vs. reflective learners, i.e. quick response vs. thinking before acting (Schmeck, 1988)
  1. Information Processing
    • Cognitive styles, i.e. typicial modes of perceiving, thinking, remembering, and problem-solving (see Kolb)
    • How people construct their views (related to the way he uses metacognition / learning strategy (Deci, Vallerand, Pellertier & Ryan, 1991).
  1. Social and Situational Interaction Among Learners
    • E.g. independent/dependent, collaborative/competitive, and participant/avoidant (Reichmann and Grasha, 1974)
  1. Instructional Methods

Santally and Senteni (2005) list the following Criteria

  • Cognitive Styles
    • Information Organising (Serial/holist)
    • Information Gathering (Visual-Auditory-Kinaesthetic)
  • Cognitive Controls
    • Field dependence/independence
    • Cognitive Flexibility v/s Cognitive Constriction
  • Learning Style preferrences
    • E.g. the Honey & Mumford model

Felder-Silverman Learning Style Model

According to Felder (1996, 1993, This model classifies students along the follogin dimensions:

  • What type of information does the student preferentially perceive :
    • sensing learners (concrete, practical, oriented toward facts and procedures) or
    • intuitive learners (conceptual, innovative, oriented toward theories and meanings);
  • Through which modality is sensory information most effectively perceived:
    • visual learners (prefer visual representations of presented material--pictures, diagrams, flow charts) or
    • verbal learners (prefer written and spoken explanations);
  • With which organization of information is the student most comfortable ?
    • inductive learners (prefer presentations that proceed from the specific to the general) or
    • deductive learners (prefer presentations that go from the general to the specific);
  • How does the student prefer to process information ?
    • active learners (learn by trying things out, working with others) or
    • reflective learners (learn by thinking things through, working alone);
  • How does the student progress toward understanding ?
    • sequential learners (linear, orderly, learn in small incremental steps) or
    • global learners (holistic, systems thinkers, learn in large leaps).

Kolb's learning styles

David Kolb's taxonomy is grounded in his experiental learning theory and it is based on the idea that a given learning style is shaped by the transaction between people and their environment (e.g. education, career, job role). According to Susan Santo [5], Kolb states that learners have two preferred ways to deal with information:

  1. Concreteness or Abstractness
  2. Activity or Reflection

However, Kolb also states that the learning process itself always engages these 4 components in a cyclical fashon.

  1. Events we are involved with (concreteness)
  2. .. lead to reflection and information collection (reflexion)
  3. .. that let us develop ideas (abstractness)
  4. .. that lead to decisions that in turn create events (activity)

To each of these four steps of the learning process we can associated four learning modes:

  • Concrete Experience (CE) - learning by feeling (involvment in an experience)
  • Reflective Observation (RO) - learning by reflection, watching, and listening
  • Abstract Conceptualization (AC) - learning by thinking
  • Active Experimentation (AE) - learning by doing

In other words, he argues that all people apply these four processes but some people tend to engage in some learning modes more than in others.

His learning styles typology [6] is based on a combination of these learning modes according to 2 dimensions

  1. Abstract conceptualization (thinking, AC) vs. concrete experience (experiencing, CE)
  2. Reflective Observation (reflecting, RO) vs. active experimentation (doing, AE)

Or to look at it in another way: they prefer either steps 1-2, 2-3, 3-4 or 4-1.

This leads to four types of learning style preferrence:

  • Diverging: combines preferences for experiencing (CE) and reflecting (RO)
  • Assimilating: combines preferences for reflecting (AC) and thinking (RO)
  • Converging: combines preferences for thinking (AC) and doing (AE)
  • Accommodating: combines preferences for doing (AE) and experiencing (CE)

The figure summarizes: Kolb-learning-style.png

Honey and Mumford's Typology of Learners

Based on Kolb's (1982) experiential learning model, Honey and Mumford proposed a similar categorization of individual learning styles:

  • Activists, prefer to act and are well equipped to experiment
  • Reflectors, prefer to study data and are well equipped to review
  • Theorists, need to tidy up and have answers, are well equipped for concluding
  • Pragmatists, like things practical, are well equipped for planning

Myers-Briggs (MBTI)

Accorting to Felder (1996), this model classifies students according to their preferences on scales derived from psychologist Carl Jung's theory of psychological types. Students may be:

  • extraverts (try things out, focus on the outer world of people) or introverts (think things through, focus on the inner world of ideas);
  • sensors (practical, detail-oriented, focus on facts and procedures) or intuitors (imaginative, concept-oriented, focus on meanings and possibilities);
  • thinkers (skeptical, tend to make decisions based on logic and rules) or feelers (appreciative, tend to make decisions based on personal and humanistic considerations);
  • judgers (set and follow agendas, seek closure even with incomplete data) or perceivers (adapt to changing circumstances, resist closure to obtain more data).

The MBTI type preferences can be combined to form 16 different learning style types. For example, one student may be an ESTJ (extravert, sensor, thinker, perceiver) and another may be an INFJ (introvert, intuitor, feeler, judger).

Jonassen and Grabowski

Jonassen and Grabowski provide the following criteria within two families:

Cognitive Styles
Information Gathering
  • Visual / Haptic
  • Visualiser / Verbaliser: preferrence for either graphics, diagrams, illustrations or words
  • Levelling / Sharpening:
Cognitive Styles
Information Organising
  • Serialist / Holist
  • Conceptual Style (Analytical / Relational)

Implications for instructional design

The literature on learning styles suggests that an instructional design should look at several issues related to cognitive styles, learning styles, etc.

  • When use examples and practice
  • Levels and mixture of concreteness/abstraction
  • Collaboration between students
  • Level of learner control

Merril (2002) argues that “Learning style is secondary in selecting the fundamental components of instructional strategy appropriate for and consistent with a given learning goal. However, learning style should be considered in selecting instructional style and adjusting the parameters of a given instructional strategy.”. His bottom line is that “Appropriate, consistent instructional strategies are determined first on the basis of the type of content to be taught or the goals of the instruction (the content-by-strategy interactions) and secondarily, learner style determines the value of the parameters that adjust or fine-tune these fundamental learning strategies (learning-style-by-strategy interactions). Finally, content-by-strategy interactions take precedence over learning-style-by-strategy interactions regardless of the instructional style or philosophy of the instructional situation.”

As an example on how to take into account learning styles, Merril (2002) presents some possible learning-style-by-strategy interactions. However, he insists that each type of learner always should engage with various strategies and content types.

  • Content sequence. Cognitive-restricted and serialist learners learn better from content arranged in a logical sequence and prefer to learn each topic in order. Cognitive-flexible or holist learners learn better when they are able to select which topic to study next and to review each topic to get a whole picture before studying each topic in detail. Note however, that when the detail study comes each type of learner must engage in the instructional strategy that is appropriate for and consistent with the instructional goal. (Merril, 2002:3)
  • Transaction Sequence. Holist learners prefer an inductive-sequence where they are presented examples and demonstrations first prior to figuring out a definition or seeing the steps listed. Serialist learners prefer a deductive-sequence where they see the definition or list of steps first prior to seeing examples or a demonstration. Nevertheless, both the inductive and deductive sequence of transaction components must still contain all the components of the appropriate and consistent strategy or there will be a decrement in learning. (Merril, 2002:3)

Transaction Configuration. Instruction is characterized by the representation of the content information included and by the addition of information, directions, and learner guidance that enhances the students ability to acquire the information presented. It is in the area of learner guidance where learning-style-by-strategy interactions may also play a significant role. Visual learners learn best when information is presented in graphic form. Verbal learners prefer textual presentations or lectures. Haptic learners prefer information they can manipulate. Nevertheless visual, verbal or haptic learners must still have all the components of an appropriate and consistent instructional strategy even though these components may have different forms of representation. (Merril, 2002:3)

Concept Instruction. In learning a concept all learners need to see examples and non-examples. However, holist learners tend to have a problem with undergeneralization, they need to see more divergent examples to promote generalization. Serialist learners tend to have a problem with overgeneralization, they need to see more matched example non-example pairs to facilitate their ability to discriminate among examples and non-examples. Both of these types of learners need examples and nonexamples as these are essential components of a concept instruction strategy. However, each type of learner requires a different emphasis in the relationships among these instances. (Merril, 2002:3)

Felder (1996) argues in a similar direction: “A learning style model is useful if balancing instruction on each of the model dimensions meets the learning needs of essentially all students in a class. [...] Which model educators choose is almost immaterial, since the instructional approaches that teach around the cycle for each of the models are essentially identical.” In other words, a good pedagogical design includes several strategies to present information and engages students in different kinds of information processing.

Felder (1996) presents a list of strategies that ensure that a course appeals to a wide range of learning styles. These suggestions are based on the Felder-Silverman model. See the Felder design model.


Links

Tests & practical stuff

The Index of Learning Styles (ILS)
  • Index of Learning Styles, instrument was developed by Richard M. Felder and Barbara A. Soloman of North Carolina State University.

Felder and Spurlin (2005) suggest to principal applications for the ILS:

  1. The first is to provide guidance to instructors on the diversity of learning styles within their student population and to help them design instruction appropriatly
  2. The second is to provide insight to students into their possible learning strenghts and weaknesses.
Others

References

  • Acharya, Chandrama (2002), Students' Learning Styles and Their Implications for Teachers, CDTL Brief, September 2002, Vol. 5 No. 6 HTML
  • Atherton, J.S. (2005) Learning and Teaching: Experiential Learning On-line UK: Accessed: 12 July 200
  • Becker, D. and M. Dwyer, (1998). "The impact of student verbal/visual learning style preference on implementing groupware in the classroom," Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks, volume 2, number 2 (September),HTML
  • Deci, E.L., Vallerand, R.J., Pelletier, L.G., & Ryan, R.M. (1991). "Motivation and Education: The Self-Determination Perspective". Educational Psychologist, 26(3\u20134), 325\u2013346.
  • Felder, R.M. (1996). "Matters of Styles". ASEE Prism, 6(4), 18-23. HTML
  • Felder, R.M. and L.K. Silverman. "Learning Styles and Teaching Styles in Engineering Education." Engr. Education, 78 (7), 674-681 (1988).
  • Felder, R.M. (1993. "Reaching the Second Tier: Learning and Teaching Styles in College Science Education," J. Coll. Sci. Teaching, 23(5), 286--290 (1993). HTML
  • Felder, R.M. and Barbara A. Solomon, Learning Styles And Strategies, webpage HTML retrieved 14:23, 24 August 2006 (MEST).
  • R.M. Felder and J.E. Spurlin, "Applications, Reliability, and Validity of the Index of Learning Styles," Intl. Journal of Engineering Education, 21(1), 103-112 (2005). A validation study of the Index of Learning Styles. PDF Reprint
  • R.M. Felder and R. Brent, "Understanding Student Differences." J. Engr. Education, 94(1), 57-72 (2005). An exploration of differences in student learning styles, approaches to learning (deep, surface, and strategic), and levels of intellectual development. PDF
  • Keefe, J.W. (1979). "Learning Style: An Overview". In NASSP"s Student Learning Styles: Diagnosing and Prescribing Programs. Reston, VA: National Association of Secondary School Principals, 1\u201317.
  • Keefe, J.W. (1989). Learning Style Profile Handbook: Accommodating Perceptual, Study and Instructional Preferences, Vol. II. Reston, VA: National Association of Secondary School Principals
  • Kim, Kyung-Sun and Joi L. Moore (2005). Web-based learning: Factors affecting students' satisfaction and learning experience, First Monday, volume 10, number 11 (November 2005) HTML
  • Kolb, Alice Y. & David A. Kolb (2005), The Kolb Learning Style Inventory- Version 3.1 2005 Technical Specifications, Experience Based Learning Systems, Inc., Case Western Reserve University, PDF
  • Irvine, J.J. & York, D.E. (1995). "Learning Styles and Culturally Diverse Students: A Literature Review". In Handbook of Research on Multicultural Education. James A. Banks (Ed.). New York: Simon & Schuster Macmillan, 484-97.
  • Jonassen, David H. & Grabowski, Barbara L. (1993). Handbook of Individual Difference, Learning, and Instruction. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.
  • Myers, I. (1978). Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. Palo Alto, CA: Consulting Psychologists Press.
  • Mayes, Terry, JISC e-Learning Models Desk Study, Stage 2: Learner-centred pedagogy: Individual differences between learners, PDF
  • Merrill, M. D. (2002). Instructional strategies and learning styles: which takes precedence? In R. A. Reiser & J. V. Dempsey (Eds.), Trends and Issues in Instructional Technology. (pp. 99-106). Columbus, OH: Prentice Hall. PDF Preprint
  • Santally, Mohammad, I. and Alain Senteni (2005), A Learning Object Approach to Personalized Web-based Instruction, European Journal of Open, Distance and E-Learning, HTML
  • Santally, M. (2003). Students Learning Styles & Computer Conferencing as a pedagogical tool to enhance and support the teaching and learning process. World Conference on E-Learning in Corp., Govt., Health., & Higher Ed. 2003(1), 1165-1168. Abstract - PDF
  • Schmeck, R. (1983). "Learning Styles of College Students". In Individual Differences in Cognition. R. Dillon & R. Schmeck (Eds.). New York: Academic Press, 233-279.
  • Schmeck, R. (1988). Learning Strategies and Learning Styles. New York: Plenum Press.
  • Witkin, H.A. (1954). Personality Through Perception: An Experimental and Clinical Study. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.
  • Witkin, H.A. & Goodenough, D. (1981). Cognitive Styles: Essence and Origins. New York: International University Press.
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