Learning styles are a must in education programs. But there seems to be a schism between education programs and research on learning and memory from the cognitive sciences. The purpose of this blog is to examine the evidence for and against learning styles.
In an effort to determine the scientific background of VARK, I have begun going through some of the more well-known references listed. In a previous post, I reviewed Roger Sperry’s split brain work and in my last post, I started reviewing Alan Baddeley’s 1984 book: Your Memory: a user’s guide.
In my last post, I reviewed echoic and iconic memory, which are types of sensory memories that are modality based (much like the VARK theory). For more on that, click here. Baddeley also discusses the visual modality extensively when examining how memories are organized and encoded.
When forming a memory, the way it is organized seems to matter. For example, words arranged in meaningful chunks are easier to remember than words that are not arranged in such meaningful chunks. This can be done with letters too (as well as many other things). For example, to remember ILOVEVARKin order is not too easy. Granted, with only nine letters there, it isn’t too difficult either. But if you notice that the spaces between those letters can be slightly rearranged to giveI LOVE VARK. This arrangement is much easier to remember. So, how something is organized seems to matter for whether or not you will remember it (or at least for how easy it will be to remember it).
Visual imagery is one technique for organizing information that many people find useful. When given a list of words to memorize, visualizing the items in the list related in some way or another can help with memorizing them. According to Baddeley:
“Suppose you were trying to associate two unrelated words like rabbit and steeple, so that whenever one of the words is given you can come up with the other. A good strategy to achieve this is to imagine a rabbit and a steeple interacting in some way; you might for example imagine a rabbit clinging to the top of a steeple. It does not matter how unlikely or strange the image is, provided the two components interact to form a single unitary image; imagining the rabbit and steeple side by side will not be a very helpful example. Having created an interactive image you will find that if you are prompted with one word of the pair the other will pop up.”
How does this relate to VARK theory? Notice that in the example used above, how the words steeple and rabbit were presented to the learner is irrelevant. Visual imagery is more about what the learner does with the words after the fact. Once they have been presented, visual imagery is a way to take information that can be visualized and to try and remember it better. More explicitly, it doesn’t matter if I were to present to you pictures of what I want you to learn (in the visual modality), written words of what I want you to learn (in the reader modality), spoken words of what I want you to learn (in the auditory modality), or real life three dimensional things that I want you to learn (kinesthetic modality). According to Baddeley’s discussion of visual imagery, how they are presented does not matter. Visual imagery is a tool to use afterwards.
Baddeley goes on to discuss an interesting experiment that was conducted with chess players. After setting up chess board pieces in a specific position, the experimenter allowed chess masters and average chess players five-second glimpses at the board. Then they had to replicate where each piece was on the board (deGroot (1966) as cited in Baddeley (1984). Who did better in this experiment? According to Baddeley, “the masters were correctly placing 90 percent of the pieces after a single five-second glance, whereas the weak players were able to position only 40 percent of the pieces correctly after one glimpse, and needed five glimpses before they could equal the initial performance of the masters.”
Does this provide evidence for a visual modality preference? After all, five-second chess board glimpses would heavily rely on the visual modality. According to the experimenters, the chess masters did not have superior visual processing abilities. Instead “De Groot argued from this and a number of other experiments that the advantage enjoyed by the masters stemmed from their ability to perceive the chess board as an organized whole, rather than as a collection of individual pieces.”
So, as with sensory memory, visual imagery does not seem to provide evidence for VARK learning style theories. Look for posts on semantic and working memory in the upcoming weeks.
References
Baddeley, A. (1984). Your Memory: A User’s Guide, England: Penguin.
Along with Sperry’s work on split-brains, the VARK theorists also list Alan Baddeley’s work on memory in their bibliography. No direct citation is provided for his work, so I cannot be sure what exactly is cited from it. After reviewing the source, I had found a handful of places where Baddeley discusses the processing of different senses/sensory modalities. In this series of posts, I will review those discussions and try to infer what is relevant to VARK (or other theory of learning modality preference) studies.
There are four different places in Baddeley’s 1984 book where he discusses modality differences in memory. They are:
1.sensory memory 2.encoding of memories 3.semantic memories 4.working memory
In this post, I will focus on sensory memory.
Sensory memory is the idea that most of what you experience through your senses is temporarily stored in a memory system that allows you to access it. The vast majority of information is lost from this system, but some of it is attended to and passed on to short-term and then long-term memory. Here is a quick illustration of the three main systems/types of memory and the way they interact (Atkinson & Shiffrin, 1968).
The existence of sensory memory was shown experimentally by George Sperling in 1960. Sperling presented subjects with 3 x 3 matrices of letters and asked them to recall (freely) as many as possible. Most subjects could recall 4-5 letters at a time. This result was fairly well known at the time and was nothing new. Sperling tweaked the experiment and had the subjects perform a cued recall. Following the presentation of the 3 x 3 matrix of letters, a second screen was presented with one location of the 3 x 3 matrix cued. Subjects were supposed to remember the specific letter that corresponded to cued location. Surprisingly, subjects were quite good at this. According to Sperling, the entire visual field had been placed into sensory memory and so any of it could be remembered via a cue. If you just ask subjects to recall freely (with no cue), they cannot remember all of the letters because by the time they have remembered a few of them, their sensory memory of the other letters has disappeared.
In his book, Baddeley discusses the existence of a visual sensory memory (called an iconic memory) and of an auditory sensory memory (called an echoic memory). This is the first place in the book where I found information related to different sensory modalities. Iconic and echoic memory systems are focused on different modalities (visual and auditory, respectively). Does the existence of these memory systems provide evidence in support of VARK? Well, VARK theories depend on individual differences in modality abilities. They believe that some people are better visually and other aurally. Is there any evidence to support this notion from the discussion of sensory memory in Baddeley’s book?
In short, no.
Baddeley (1984) has no discussion of whether individual differences occur between iconic and echoic memory systems. Baddeley does discuss differences between these systems, but suggests that these differences are more universal:
“The existence of a rather more durable auditory memory system can be shown as follows. Suppose I were to read out to you a series of nine-figure telephone numbers, The chances are that you would get most figures of each number right, but would tend to make errors. If I then switched to a system of presenting the numbers visually, one figure at a time, you would find that you made rather more errors, particularly towards the end of the sequence…. A sequence of spoken numbers is better remembered than a sequence of numbers presented visually because auditory sensory memory appears to be more durable that visual.”
From Baddeley (1984). The number of errors made is graphed above. The dark curve is for iconic memory and the light curve is for echoic memory. As you can see, people make more errors in iconic (vsual) memory towards the end of a sequence compared to echoic (auditory) memory.
To be completely honest, there is one place in his discussion of sensory memory where Baddeley mentions some individual differences. He discusses the length of time that subjects are able to hold something in auditory sensory memory and says: “…subjects vary somewhat in their capabilities, but on average can detect repetitions separated by up to three seconds, indicating an auditory memory system of at least this duration.”
Is this brief mention of individual differences in echoic memory evidence for VARK theories? I don’t believe so. Baddeley is saying that some people have longer temporal capacities for their echoic memories, but he does not discuss that the iconic memory system may compensate for this in some patients. For these data to support VARK theories, some subjects would have to demonstrate better iconic memories than echoic memories and vice versa. Instead, according to Baddeley, we universally see a more “durable” auditory sensory memory system compared to visual sensory memory. We just see slight differences in the capabilities of everyone’s auditory sensory memory.
References
Atkinson, R. C., & Shiffrin, R. M. (1968). Human memory: A proposed system and its control processes. In K. W. Spence (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation: Advances in research and theory (Vol. 2) (pp. 89-195). New York: Academic Press.
Baddeley, A. (1984). Your Memory: A User’s Guide, England: Penguin.
Sperling, George (1960). "The information available in brief visual presentations". Psychological Monographs74: 1–29.
Reviewing the sources for Fleming’s VARK model took me to the Roger Sperry (1973) article first. My first goal was to try to figure out why VARK theorists (such as Neil Fleming) cite Sperry’s work. In the VARK literature, I could find one article that explicitly cites Sperry’s work (Fleming and Mills, 1992). Here is the quote:
“By questioning students, we found that many students attributed their learning difficulties to the form in which course material was presented. Some students found they had difficulties learning in situations where the course material was only presented orally, while others reported similar difficulties when the material was primarily in written form. Still other students experienced difficulty with ideas that were presented in graphics or 'without any associated concrete experiences.’ These insights prompted us to focus on sensory modality as a learning style dimension that had some preeminence over others. The notion that the way information is initially taken in by a learner influences what subsequently occurs has intuitive appeal.
“We found support for this notion in literature on neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) (Handler, 1976, 1979; McLeod, 1990; Stirling, 1987) that discussed the different perceptual modalities (aural, visual, and kinesthetic). The following questions were suggested from our exploration of this field of study, split-brain research (Gazzaniga, 1973; Sperry, 1973; Springer & Deutsch, 1985) and left brain/right brain modalities (Buzan, 1991; Edwards,1979):
1. How can students be encouraged to reflect on the nature, extent and implications of their sensory modalities?
2. As a consequence of exploring their sensory modality preference, will students modify their existing learning strategies in ways that assist their learning?”
Unfortunately, this citation tells me little about what they find relevant from the Sperry article. With little guidance from their citation, I had to go in search of what might be relevant in the field of split brain research to VARK myself.
It wasn’t hard to find what VARK theorists found relevant from Sperry’s work. In the first paragraph of his article, Sperry claims “…our education system, as well as science in general, tends to neglect the nonverbal form of intellect. What it comes down to is that modern society discriminates against the right hemisphere.” While this quote might be relevant to VARK’s idea that various learning modalities are not addressed the way they should be, this is the only mention of this idea in the entire Sperry article. The remainder of the article is a scientific review of split brain research that had been completed up until 1973. Let’s explore Sperry’s ideas and work a bit more to see if we can find any other evidence that could be used to support the VARK theory.
To give you a little background, Roger Sperry started his career by studying hemispheric specialization in cats. In a landmark study at CalTech, he examined cats that had been given a split brain. We know that the brain has two halves (hemispheres). Normally, the two hemispheres are connected (by a structure known as the corpus callosum), and information that the right side gets is readily shared with the left side and vice versa. However, Sperry found that if the corpus callosum is severed (aka split-brain), one side of the brain can learn something and the other side can be oblivious to this.
In his experiment with cats, Sperry presented one half of the cat’s brain with a maze to learn and navigate. He did this by covering one eye of the cat and thus only information from the uncovered eye went into the brain. He had cut the optic chiasm which kept the information from each eye separated to its own side of the brain. In other words, information from the right eye went only to the right hemisphere and information from the left eye went only to the left hemisphere.
Sperry taught one side of the cat’s brain how to navigate a maze. Then he changed the eye that was covered and showed that while one side had learned the maze, the other side of the cat’s brain had learned nothing. The second side could be taught how to navigate the maze as well, but had to be taught separately from the first side. This experiment showed that the two halves of the brain can operate independently. Sperry was even able to change the specifics to the learning experiment so the two halves of the brain learned opposite things (Sperry, 1961). Cool, huh?
As with any good science, these findings lead to many questions. Since Sperry’s work suggested that the two halves of the brain can operate independently, how complete are the operational capabilities for one hemisphere of the brain? Could both halves of the brain speak, read, write, add, subtract, grab, remember, etc? Or does each hemisphere need the other to be able to function properly?
To answer these questions let’s fast forward to the work that was cited in the VARK paper. Sperry (1973) is a review of work (mostly in humans) about hemispheric specialization (ie what each half of the brain is capable of doing). Sperry offers the following answer to the question posed above:
“A long series of studies indicate that the two disconnected hemispheres function independently and in effect have each a separate mind of its own. Each of the separated hemispheres appears to have its own private sensations, perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and memories. Each hemisphere has its own inner visual world, each cut off from the conscious awareness of the other.”
He describes patients that have surgically had their corpus callosum cut. This procedure is done as a treatment for extreme cases of epilepsy with very positive results. But what about the side effects of this operation? Sure their epilepsy may be controlled, but at what cost. Can they still function without their two hemispheres connected and communicating?
The answer is surprising to many. Sperry explains it well: “The behavioral symptoms produced by severance of these enormous systems of fiber cross-connections are found first of all to be surprisingly inconspicuous in ordinary behavior. The hemispheres continue to function in the separated state at a fairly high level such that a person two years recovered and otherwise in good condition could easily go through a routine medical checkup without revealing that anything was particularly wrong.” That is, there are no noticeable deficits in split brain humans. How can this be explained? From above, it is stated that the two hemispheres can operate independently. If they are cut and operating independently, wouldn’t there be some sort of sign of this? One might reasonably expect that the two hemispheres would disagree periodically and show conflicting behaviors, right?
That is not what we see in the vast majority of these patients (except in extreme cases where alien hand syndrome develops- you should google that one if you are interested). What does happen though is that in most patients one hemisphere seems to become dominant over the other. Interestingly, there is a pattern to which hemisphere takes over; it is usually the left hemisphere. Researchers believe that this is because the left hemisphere has language abilities and the right hemisphere does not. Since the world around us requires language to a large extent, the thoughts and processes of the language hemisphere appear to be dominantly expressed. I found the following quote quite interesting: “The disconnected minor hemisphere, lacking language like the animal brain and thus unable to communicate what it is thinking or experiencing, is much less accessible to investigation, and accordingly the nature and quality of the inner mental life of the silent right hemisphere have remained relatively obscure. There is reluctance in some quarters to credit the minor hemisphere even with being conscious, the contention being that it is carried along in a reflex, trance-like state, with consciousness centered over in the dominant left hemisphere.”
Here is a great youtube video on split brain studies and left vs right hemisphere differences.
Let’s try to bring this back to VARK. Sperry makes the argument that the left hemisphere does certain tasks and the right hemisphere does others. He suggests in the beginning of the article that the tasks that are typically “right hemisphere” tasks are ignored or discounted in our current education system and in society. From what I can tell, the learning style (in this case VARK) theorists liked this particular idea.
Let’s get into Sperry’s discussion a little more. Sperry makes the point that the right hemisphere is not without its strengths. To quote Sperry: “From its nonverbal responses we infer that the minor hemisphere senses, perceives, thinks and feels all at a characteristically human level, and that it learns and remembers and has some reasoning capacity and considerable perceptual insight that is superior to that of the major hemisphere for certain things. Also that it may even do some silent reading of object names and some drawing, not to mention various things that we have not yet tested.”
The right hemisphere appeared better at block designs, drawing figures, and other spatial tasks (such as transforming a 3D figure into a 2D representation). This increase in performance is found when the stimuli are presented visually or when the stimuli are given to the left hand to touch (the left hand is controlled by the right hemisphere of the brain).
According to Sperry, “The right hemisphere excelled in acquiring concepts that involved spatial qualities like height, size, shape, and the left excelled when the concepts involved familiar objects with distinctions that were easily verbalized.” Sperry even discusses one manipulation where subjects were presented words written in cursive. If subjects were asked about the meaning of the word, the left hemisphere was far superior. When subjects were required to match the visual look of the word to another stimulus, the right hemisphere was found to be superior.
There do seem to be exceptions to the “left dominant” pattern that is typical in most patients. Sperry discusses finding some patients that have developed language bilaterally (in both hemispheres). Sperry claims that if both “verbal and nonverbal perceptual functions … develop within the same hemisphere, the latter were apparently handicapped in favor of verbal development.” Specifically, there are patients that are born without a corpus callosum, and many times these patients are found to have language abilities in both hemispheres. This added language development seems to be detrimental to non-linguistic functions.
Sperry also discusses left-handers in his article. Left-handers are more likely to show bilateral language development than right-handers. Some studies have found that left-handers are inferior to right-handers in basic perceptual tests for field dependency and tactual localization. One study found that left-handers showed three times greater discrepancy between the verbal and nonverbal performance on the WAIS (an intelligence test) (Levy (1969) as cited in Sperry (1973)). Another study found that patients that had developed right hemisphere speech as a result of early birth injury also had a similar discrepancy (Landsell (1969) as cited in Sperry (1973)). A third study found the left-handers scored very significantly below right-handers on a spatial task. The authors claimed that the scores for the left-handers were so far below those of the right-handers, that their data distributions hardly overlapped at all (Nebes (1971) as cited in Sperry (1973)).
On a side note, Sperry discusses some evidence that language might not always develop as well in people that have bilateral speech development either. A study of four patients that had been stammerers since early childhood found that they all had developed bilateral speech.
Yet again, I find myself needing to bring this back to the discussion of learning styles and specifically to VARK. Sperry and other split brain researchers discuss differences in abilities for left and right hemispheres on various types of tasks. Some of the activities where hemispheric differences in performance were found include language and spatial components. The basis of the VARK theory is that there are individual differences across the visual, auditory, reading/writing, and kinesthetic preferred modes of learning. The obvious parallel is that the right hemisphere may process kinesthetic aspects of things better and the left hemisphere may process reading/writing aspects better. That’s nice and all, but I have to ask… so what?
Here’s the problem with this- simply stating that the two hemispheres do different things and thus we might be unintentionally biasing instruction (or society) against one hemisphere doesn’t mean much. First, the data regarding hemispheric specialization is not perfectly clean. Some studies have shown that a handful of people have bilateral language processing. That is, they can speak with either hemisphere. Other studies have found that speech production may in fact be predominantly a left hemisphere function, but that speech perception (listening and comprehending) is done by both hemispheres. One study used the WADA procedure to put the left hemisphere of the brain “to sleep.” Once the left hemisphere is essentially out of the picture, subjects can be tested and their responses are thought to be the result of the right hemisphere. Subjects were found to be able to understand language, but not produce it (Hickok et al, 2008).
A direct application of the VARK ideas to Sperry’s data would indicate that more right hemisphere applicable tasks need to be introduced into school curricula. However, what about those students that have bilateral language processing? Remember that Sperry discusses evidence that this group is likely to score lower on spatial tasks. So, by introducing more spatial activities into instruction, aren’t we biasing the class against this particular group of students?
VARK theorists may say “What about those students that have higher spatial than verbal abilities?” According to Sperry, when both verbal and non-verbal are forced to develop, the verbal wins out. This is not to say that individuals cannot be better spatially than linguistically. However, those that have developed spatial abilities in one hemisphere probably have developed linguistic abilities in the other. Thus, that group of students should still be able to process things linguistically.
Here’s the other big problem- most of us don’t have split brain. Anything one hemisphere gets is shared with the other hemisphere. So, if instruction is biased to one half of the brain, that should be ok because both hemispheres are getting the information and thus both hemispheres are available to retrieve the information. Most tests in school are conducted in written form. So, the left hemisphere is necessary and dominant for completing the exams. But, who cares? The left hemisphere has access to what the right hemisphere knows, unless we are talking about a split brain patient.
Fleming, N.D. & Mills, C. (1992). Not Another Inventory, Rather a Catalyst for Reflection. To Improve the Academy, 11, 137-155.
Hickok, G., Okada, K., Barr, W., Pa, J., Rogalsky, C., Donnelly, K., Barde, L. & Grant, A. (2008). Bilateral capacity for speech sound processing in auditory comprehension: Evidence from Wada procedures. Brain and Language, 107, 179-184.
Sperry, R. W. (1961). Cerebral Organization and Behavior. Science, 133(3466), 1749-1757.
Sperry, R. (1973). Lateral specialization of cerebral function in the surgically separated hemisphere. In F. J. McGulgan, & R. A. Schoonover, (Eds.), The psychophysiology of thinking (pp. 209-229). New York. Academic Press.
After the past few posts, I needed one that was a little shorter and less intense. One of the things I first noticed when reviewing some of the VARK papers (Fleming, 2006; Fleming, 1995) was that they didn’t cite other research. One of the papers had a link to a research bibliography (http://www.vark-learn.com/english/page.asp?p=bibliography). On this page, along with in the initial VARK paper (Fleming & Mills, 1992), I found some interesting sources.
Some of these are expected based on my previous posts (Bandler and Grinder’s The Structure of Magic Vol I and II, and Frogs into Princes- for more on these see my post on Neuro-Linguistic Programming here). But some of these came as a surprise. For example, Mike Gazzaniga’s and Roger Sperry’s work in the split brain experiments are listed here. Also, listed is Alan Baddeley’s work with memory. My experience with these three is minimal, but any student of psychology has some experience with the work of these three researchers.
To elaborate a bit: Roger Sperry won a Nobel prize in 1981 for his work with cats and, later, with monkeys. So, his work was obviously well received. I was lucky enough to see Mike Gazzaniga give the keynote address at Cognitive Neuroscience Society a few years back. He discussed his work with split brain populations (some of which he worked on with Sperry, I believe). Gazzaniga writes well-received textbooks in psychology (Psychological Science, and a book in Cognitive Neuroscience as well- the name has slipped my mind).
As far as Alan Baddeley, he is a HUGE name in learning and memory research. Baddeley has developed one of the main models for processing memories which is discussed in most introductory courses. He has written many articles and books on memory as well.
So, I guess this post is a bit of a teaser. Seeing these articles cited within the VARK bibliography makes me wonder what exactly from these articles was used to develop VARK. Going into these will be a topic of my next few posts.
References:
Fleming, N.D. & Mills, C. (1992). Not Another Inventory, Rather a Catalyst for Reflection. To Improve the Academy, 11, 137-155.
Fleming, N.D; (1995), I'm different; not dumb. Modes of presentation (VARK) in the tertiary classroom, in Zelmer,A., (ed.) Research and Development in Higher Education, Proceedings of the 1995 Annual Conference of the Higher Education and Research Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA),HERDSA, Volume 18, 308 – 313.
Fleming, N., and Baume, D. (2006) Learning Styles Again: VARKing up the right tree!, Educational Developments, SEDA Ltd, Issue 7.4, Nov. 2006, 4-7.
There is a decent amount of classroom based research out there using learning styles. Here is a review of one paper I found that has some interesting information.
For this study, instructors in an Introduction to Design course (from the Engineering Dept) restructured their course to include more of a “hands-on” component. They wanted to know whether the restructuring helped some types of students more than others. So, students in the course were given the VARK questionnaire and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) to classify their learning preferences. To assess the effectiveness of the lectures, the students were given a survey (immediately following each lecture) to measure various self-perceptions about how the material had been taught (including things like interest level and applicability). Through this, the authors tried to examine whether the class restructuring was more “helpful” for certain types of learners compared to others.
Two different professors that taught the course were involved in this study. They examined each of the lectures in the class and evaluated them individually for the amount of “hands-on” content in the lecture. Weights of 0, 1, 2, or 3 were assigned to each lecture. A 3 indicated continuous hands-on interaction throughout the lecture. A 2 indicated hands-on activity for most of the lecture, while a 1 indicated that there was a hands-on demo in the class (and a hands-off lecture). A weight of 0 would indicate no hands-on component for the lecture (this is my inference, since this was not articulated in the paper).
They examined the Kinesthetic (K) learners vs non-Kinesthetic (non-K) learners from the VARK questionnaire and they examined the Intuition (N) vs the Sensing (S) types from the MBTI. The N type (from MBTI) “focuses on possibilities, future use, [and the] big picture.” The S type (from MBTI) “focuses on the five senses and experience.” According to the MBTI, these are indicative of the “manner in which a person processes information.” Jenson and Bowe hypothesized that their course restructuring will help S types more than N types. They also hypothesized that the K learners will be helped more than the non-K learners (see previous posts for explanations of the VARK theory and questionnaire).
To examine whether the lectures were helpful, they gave a quick survey to their students. The survey asked students:
Please rate the following statements on a scale from 1 to 10:
1.Today’s class kept me interested.
2.Today’s class was a good learning experience.
3.This class prepared me well to apply today’s concepts to problems.
4.This class motivated me to further explore today’s concept.
Although these are all valuable questions to ask, there is a fairly large issue (in my opinion) with this survey. These survey questions are asking for opinions. In question 3, students were asked whether they felt that the lecture prepared them to apply what they learned to problems. This is a good question; however, the survey was given before the students actually did their HW (it was given right after the lecture). A student may feel that the lecture has prepared them, but how accurate is that perception? Where is the evidence that these students are actually prepared? There is nothing here about class performance. How did these changes affect the grades of these students? That would have made a much more compelling argument in favor of learning styles.
Let’s look through the data:
The first noticeable thing is that the mean rating for each of the four questions that are provided for S types, N types, K types, and non-K types show interesting patterns. Notice that N-types rate higher than S-types (on average) for each question except the first. Non-K types rate higher than K-types on all four of the questions. This is a bit shocking considering that, according to the paper, 75% of the lectures have a significant hands-on component after the restructuring. If there is such a large hands-on component, why are the non-K types rating them all higher? One explanation may be that the 75% given early in the paper is not an accurate number. In some of the graphs provided in this paper, I was able to count the number of lectures that were given each particular hands-on weight. The weights reveal that 8 of the 17 lectures received either a 1, 2, or 3. This particular contradiction is not addressed in the paper. How can 75% of the lectures have a significant hands-on component, yet less than 50% of them get assigned a hands-on weight of 1, 2, or 3. That just doesn’t make sense.
The top column indicates mean (X-bar) and standard deviations (sigma) for each question (Q =1, 2, 3, or 4)
From Jenson and Bowe (1999)
Next, the authors decided to look at average deviation from the mean. This can be useful when looking at how ratings changed. Because the N types started off higher than the S types, a direct comparison of their scores would be misleading. So, instead the authors chose to examine how the scores changed. They asked questions like: are the S types more likely to deviate above the mean than the N types? They asked the same question for the K types vs the non-K types.
Again the data are interesting. The authors report their largest differences for questions 1 and 2. According to the paper, for question 1 (about whether the lecture was interesting), S types scored ½ a standard deviation above the mean and N types scored 1/20 of a standard deviation below the mean. K types scored about 1/10 of a standard deviation above the mean while non-K types scored 1/3 of a standard deviation below it. Is it surprising that people that identify themselves as having a preference for kinesthetic information find lectures with hands-on components more interesting? Not really. The same can be said for the difference between the S and N types in this question- this data is really not very surprising considering the S types prefer to have information through their senses rather than to be given a hypothetical or theoretical idea to deal with. The more hands-on a lecture, the more satisfied the K and the S types.
The data for question 2 is actually a little disturbing from a teaching perspective. Question 2 is about whether the lecture was a good “learning experience.” S types see a small increase above their mean response (1/5 of a standard deviation) with the hands-on lectures and N-types see no real change for hands-on when compared to non-hands-on lectures (1/100 of a standard deviation decrease below the mean). While S types find that the hands-on components increase their learning experience, the N types don’t seem to care. Again, since we are dealing with preferences of sensory modality here, this is not a surprising result. The surprise comes when the K vs Non-K data is examined.
K types rated the hands-on lectures approx 1/20 of a standard deviation higher than the mean rating. That is not a large effect by any stretch of the imagination. The non-K types rated the hands-on lectures nearly ½ of a standard deviation below the mean. Now, I know the purpose of this study was to find ways to benefit those students with “learning styles” that are usually neglected with traditional teaching methods- I get that. But their “hands-on” lectures actually led to a large portion of the class saying that those lectures were a lower than average learning experience. This decrease for the non-K types was not accompanied by an increase for the K types. One can conclude that the addition of the hands-on components decreased learning experiences for some students while providing no increase for others. That is a net loss for students- why make such a change?
Thus far, I have given my explanations and responses for their explanations of their data. As usual, I like to look at the data itself to draw my own conclusions. The figures provided in this study provide some additional information that isn’t given in the author’s conclusions. For example, the ratings are all over the place. I have summarized how many data points (lecture ratings) were above and below the mean ratings for the various groups below. In italics are all of the ratings that fly in the face of the general pattern described by the authors (namely that S types do better with hands-on than N types and that K types do better at hands-on than non-K types).
Notice that of the 12 comparisons made overall for the lectures with hands-on content in these figures, 5 of them are bolded and italicized. That means that 5/12 of their comparisons either show no difference between the type of learner or show a difference that is the exact opposite from what the authors proposed. I did not go through this analysis for their ratings from survey questions 3 and 4. The data from those are even less convincing.
Also I believe it is important to note that the information that was being studied was a greater predictor for the class responses than the amount of hands-on components in the lectures. For example, lectures 7 and 14 have universally low ratings. This was true across nearly all of their survey questions and across all of their learning types (in both MBTI and VARK). Perhaps the more important factor is the information being provided and communicated to the students and not the way it was communicated. Notice that lecture 7 was weighted as a 3 for their hands-on scoring and that lecture 14 was weighted a 0 for their hands-on scoring. Are learning style theorists making this an issue of style over substance? Maybe all that matters is the substance (the material) and the style (Visual, Auditory, Reading, Kinesthetic) is irrelevant? These data seem to support that notion.
The authors conclude with “…overall it is shown that the addition of the hand-on experiences significantly improves design courses.” I am disappointed with the use of the word “significantly” here- from what is written in the paper, no statistical significance testing was conducted in this study. Also, I really wonder what is meant by “improves design courses.” We have no idea whether students were more successful in these courses due to their restructuring.
References
Jensen, D., Bowe, M. (1999). “Hands-on Experiences to Enhance Learning of Design: Effectiveness in a Reverse Engineering / Redesign Context When Correlated with MBTI and VARK Types,” Proceedings of ASEE Annual Conf., Charlotte, NC.
As I have been promising, here is the much awaited post on the origins of VARK (for information on what VARK is, see previous posts).
Searching for the origins of VARK led me on what I can only compare to a family tree research project. Trying to track the origins of VARK was not easy; many of the papers on VARK (including many of the Fleming papers I have previously reviewed) are lacking in citations. However, in the initial VARK paper (Fleming & Mills, 1992) the authors mention that there had previously been discussion of the influence of sensory modality preferences on behavior and learning in research and theories that surrounded a topic known as Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP).
Now, I have a BS in neurobiology and a PhD in psychology (my research was in cognitive neuroscience). My graduate advisor studies language and the brain and has helped to develop one of the eminent models for how language is processed in the human brain. So, one would naturally conclude that I have studied something called Neuro-linguistic programming…right?
Wrong! I can honestly say that before VARK I had never heard of NLP. I would venture to assume that my former advisor, an expert on language and the brain (he is writing a textbook on the subject), has never heard of NLP. So, what the heck is NLP?
My searching led me to find that NLP was created by Richard Bandler (a student of mathematics and computer science) and John Grinder (professor of Linguistics). According to Tosey & Mathison (2007), NLP “denotes a view that a person is a whole mind-body system with patterned connections between internal experience (‘neuro’), language (‘linguistic’), and learned behavioral strategies (‘programming’).”
From what I can piece together, the original NLP studies consisted of case studies of three psychotherapists: Fritz Perls (founder of Gestalt therapy), Virginia Satir (a family therapist), and Milton Erikson (a hypnotherapist) (Tosey & Mathison, 2007). Bandler and Grinder noticed that there were certain characteristic in common with the way that these therapists treated their patients. They noticed language use, tone of language, body language, and many other behaviors these therapists emplyed during their psychotherapy sessions. Bandler and Grinder deemed these three therapists as very successful therapists (I have no idea whether they are correct or not- that's getting way off topic). The point was, if they could specifically address and model the specific behaviors of a successful therapist, other therapists could be trained to employ such techniques as well and more patients could be helped.
So, Bandler and Grinder's theory was specifically developed with therapeutic applications in mind, but (since the 1970's) has been more generally applied as a method of communication and personal development in the following fields: managerial, sales, marketing, consulting, medicine, and law.
To backtrack a bit, I have a confession to make. When I first saw that there was this topic (NLP) which I had never heard of, I did what I usually do whenever I want to look up information on something that I otherwise know nothing about- I googled it and followed the first link to Wikipedia. Now, this is pretty hypocritical of me. I don't allow students to use Wikipedia as a source for their research papers. I always tell my students to look at Wikipedia for information, but to just make sure you go and validate that information with a more reputable source (a journal article or a book). But here I go quoting Wikipedia anyway:
Reviews of empirical research on NLP showed that NLP contains numerous factual errors, and failed to produce reliable results for the claims for effectiveness made by NLP’s originators and proponents. According to Devilly, NLP is no longer as prevalent as it was in the 70s and 80s. Criticisms go beyond the lack of empirical evidence for effectiveness; critics say that NLP exhibits pseudoscientific characteristics, title, concepts and terminology. NLP is used as an example of pseudoscience for facilitating the teaching of scientific literacy at the professional and university level. NLP also appears on peer reviewed expert-consensus based lists of discredited interventions. In research designed to identify the “quack factor” in modern mental health practice, Norcross et al (2006) list NLP as possibly or probably discredited, and in papers reviewing discredited interventions for substance and alcohol abuse, Norcross et al (2008) list NLP in the “top ten” most discredited, and Glasner-Edwards and Rawson (2010) list NLP as “certainly discredited”.
So I had just started looking into NLP and already my “uh-oh” radar was going off .
When looking for the theoretical papers on NLP, I found that most of that information had been published in a handful of books. These were titled The Structure of Magic I: A book about language and therapy and The Structure of Magic II: A book about communication and change. Their most popular book on NLP was titled Frogs into Princes. This set my "uh oh" radar going again. This focus on book writing instead of journal article writing is important in academics. Books are not peer-reviewed. True scientific writing, theory, and research goes into a journal. All writing in journals goes through a rigorous peer review process (if you have ever been on the receiving side of a tough review, you know just how rigorous this process can be!).
Alas, my purpose for this post was not to write about NLP's merit or lack of merit. My purpose was to write about how NLP led to VARK. This is why it has taken me so long to write this particular post. I wanted to find specific parts of NLP and how those eventually branched into VARK, not get into the “NLP is good or bad” argument. After much searching, I eventually found what I was looking for.
So, one way to define NLP is as a method/model of effective communication. Such a model would contain various components of the communication process including specifics on the sending and receiving of information. The NLP model includes all of this and even further subdivided effective communication into verbal and non-verbal processes and many other categories.
To elaborate, NLP proposed that we have “representational systems” (also known as sensory modalities) as part of our communication process: "At the core of NLP is the belief that, when people are engaged in activities, they are also making use of a representational system; that is, they are using some internal representation of the materials they are involved with, such as a conversation, a rifle shot, a spelling task. These representations can be visual, auditory, kinesthetic, or involve the other senses. In addition, a person may be creating a representation or recalling one. For example, a person asked to spell a word may visualize that word printed on a piece of paper, may hear it being sounded out, or may construct the spelling from the application of a series of logical rules." (Druckman, 1988)
To represent all of the senses, the abbreviation VAKOG (Visual, Auditory, Kinesthetic, Olfactory, and Gustatory) was formed. Over time, it was refined to VAK, as those are the three main sensory modalities that are used. One of the more bizarre and refuted aspects of NLP is that someone’s eye gaze reveals their mode of internal processing. This portion of the theory is just plain bizarre (and according to research, just plain wrong!- see Sharpley (1987) for more on this). See the image below- this was claimed to be one of the common arrangements for how eye movements and internal processing related.
From Bandler and Grinder (1979)
Vc = constructed visual image (ie. imagining something in pictures)
Vr = recalling visual image (ie. remembering something in pictures)
Ac = constructed auditory signal (ie. imagining something in sounds)
Ar = recalling auditory signal (ie. remembering something in sounds)
K = kinesthetic processing (ie. Revealed by their use of words- for example, if someone is thinking about a topic and they say “I just can’t get a grip on it” – the use of the word grip indicates kinesthetic processing)
Ai = auditory internal dialogue (ie. Talking to one’s self)
Bandler and Grinder also proposed that we have preferred "representational systems" that we use when communicating with others. It is not hard to see how this particular aspect of NLP lead to current VARK learning style theories.
On a related side note, Bandler later backpedaled on the "preferred representational systems" part of NLP theory and had revised NLP to minimize the importance of such systems (Druckman, 1988)).
So, it appears NLP suggested preferred representational systems (sensory modalities), labeled them as VAKOG, then VAK, and Fleming & Mills (1992) tweaked it to VARK.
Daniel Druckman (Ed.) (1988), Enhancing Human Performance: Issues, Theories, and Techniques(pp.138-139)
Sharpley C.F. (1987). "Research Findings on Neuro-linguistic Programming: Non supportive Data or an Untestable Theory". Journal of Counseling Psychology, 34, (1), pp 103–107,105.
Bandler, R & Grinder J. (1979). Frogs into Princes: Neuro Linguistic Programming. Moab, UT: Real People Press.
Fleming, ND & Mills, C. (1992). "Not Another Inventory. Rather a Catalyst for Relection." To Improve the Academy, 11, 137-155.
Tosey, P & Mathison, J. (2007). "Fabulous Creatures of HRD: A Critical Natural History of Neuro-Linguistic Programming." International Conference on Human Resource Development Research and Practice across Europe, Oxford Business School.
My apologies for the delay between posts- I have been reading through quite a few learning style papers out there and had some trouble deciding where to go with my next post. The vast majority of my reading focused on the topic of Neuro-Linguistic Programming, which will be the focus of a post in the near future.
For the current post, I decided to review a paper published last year by John Dobson from the University of Florida. Dobson published a paper looking at learning style preferences in an exercise physiology class. The article is written with the assumption that learning styles exist; so, the purpose of Dobson’s paper wasn’t to examine the existence of learning styles. His purpose appears to be to examine the proportion of learner type amongst groups of students in an exercise physiology class. Specifically, he wanted to know whether graduate students and undergraduate students have different learning style preferences. He also wanted to know whether a difference in preferences existed across genders and, at the end of the study, he examines whether course performance had anything to do with learning style preference.
In the study, Dobson compared perceived modality preferences and assessed modality preferences across his domains of interest. Basically, he asked students what they thought was their modality preference for learning (Visual, Auditory, Reading, or Kinesthetic). He called this their perceived learning style preference. Then he gave them the VARK questionnaire to assess their learning style preference. He called this their assessed learning style preference. Some similarities were found as well as some interesting differences.
The study found that 59% of the time the perceived modality preference and the assessed modality preference matched. The authors claim that this matches the numbers that Neil Fleming has found (see previous posts for discussion of Fleming’s work). A closer look at the data reveals that this number is not very impressive. 64 students completed the study. According to the data, 38 students (59%) had a match between their perceived modality preference and the assessed modality preference. However, in this study, many students (24) were classified as VARK learners by the assessment (which means that they have no real preference, but instead are happy receiving information in either visual, auditory, reading, or kinesthetic modality). It is not very impressive that these particular 24 students matched their VARK score and their perceived preference; given that they have no specific preference, they could have answered ANYTHING on the perceived preference portion of the experiment and Dobson would have concluded that their perceived and assessed learning style preferences “matched.” Again, that means 24 of the 38 that “match” would have matched regardless of what they had listed for their perceived preference!
So, we can get a more accurate gauge about how the perceived preferences and the assessed (ie VARK) preferences matched by excluding that group of 24 students. If we do this, there are 40 students that had a specific preference of one or more modality (ie. all students that were not classified as a VARK learner). Only 14 of those 40 matched with their perceived preferences. That is only a 35% concordance rate for the VARK questionnaire matching perceived preferences, which is quite low and may question the validity of the assessment tool. In another 14 of these 40 students, VARK found a minor preference for their perceived learning style preference. That leaves 12 students (of the 40) where VARK didn’t even list off their perceived learning style preference at all. So these data from this study question the validity of the VARK assessment. How accurate is VARK if it doesn’t match perceived preferences in a majority of cases?
The study wanted to examine whether status, gender, and class performance (grade) varied across learning style preference. For status, the study found no difference between preferences of graduate and undergraduate students (either perceived preferences or assessed preferences).
For gender, the study found no significant differences between preferences of males and females. However, it should be noted that the test statistics were very close to significance for the gender domain. The author claims that this may indicate that a difference really does exist, but due to a small sample (only 40 women and 24 men) they did not achieve significance. A closer look into the data suggests that there might be more going on here than meets the eye. As previously discussed, there were large divergences between assessed preferences and perceived preferences. This was when comparing males and females as well. The perceived preference data shows different patterns for males and females: R preference: 35% female, 17% male; V preference: 25% female, 54% male; A preference: 22% female, 8% male and K preference: 18% female, 21% male. Notice the largest differences between male and female here are in the visual modality and in the reading modality, with the kinesthetic modality having nearly equivalent proportions of males and females.
Assessed preferences show that largest gender difference between those that are K learners (13% male, 5% female), those that are A learners (7% female, 0% male), and many of the combinations of modality preferences (ie the VARK will classify people as a VK (visual and kinesthetic) or a VA (visual and auditory) and all other combinations). I have pasted the table with these data below so that you can see for yourself. The take home point here is that there were no significant differences between genders and the differences that might be there are different depending upon whether using perceived learning style preference or assessed learning style preference. I’ll spend more time on this later in this post.
From Dobson, 2010
For class performance, Dobson found no difference between undergraduate and graduate students (I would assume that grad students would get more difficult assignments and exams which makes comparing these groups difficult- if not, one would question the quality of graduate students that barely outscore undergraduates, no?). No gender differences were found in class performance.
For assessed sensory modality (by VARK), there were no differences found in class performance. With perceived sensory modality, the kinesthetic learners significantly underperformed compared to the rest of the class. Here again is another difference between the perceived learning style preference and what VARK found: as assessed by the VARK, no difference was found with kinesthetic learners.
The author lists the four main conclusions of the study as “1) Nearly two-third of the respondents correctly matched their perceived and dominant assessed sensory modality preferences, 2) there was a significant relationship between perceived sensory modality preferences and course scores, 3) there was no association between sensory modality preferences and status, and 4) there was a nearly significant trend in sensory modality preferences and sex.”
Three of the four conclusions are questionable. Conclusion #3 is ok in my book. Conclusion #1 is a bit misleading, as a large portion of those that “matched” their perceived and assessed learning style preferences had been classified as a VARK and thus would have matched with ANY perceived learning style preference. Conclusion #2 is supported by the data. In fact, the author discussed a previous study that he had conducted which found similar low scoring K learners in physiology classes. But why is this only found in those that perceive themselves as a K learner and not in those that are assessed as a K learner? This serves as further disagreement between VARK assessed learning style preferences and the perceived learning style preferences (more evidence against conclusion #1).
Dobson suggests that teachers may need to focus on K learners in physiology classes and review their teaching styles and practices to ensure that these learners are being helped. Another interpretation comes from other evidence which suggests that those that perceive that they have a learning style preference that is not in line with a teacher’s style of teaching may assume that they are going to do worse and simply not try as hard. Thus, they may be self-handicapping themselves (Reiner, 2010-2011). It is possible that the K learners may be doing this, and thus they will score lower. Thus, the classification of these students into a specific learning style preference may be detrimental to their success in class.
For conclusion #4, the data is quite messy. Statistically speaking, the difference between learning style preferences for males and females is not significant, but it is close. However, a comparison between gender differences between the perceived preferences and the assessed preferences shows no real pattern. Again, the disparity between the perceived preferences here and the assessed preferences provides more support against conclusion #1, but also makes interpretation of conclusion #4 impossible.
Overall, this study doesn’t really provide evidence for or against learning styles; that wasn’t their purpose. However, the data from this study question the validity of the VARK as an assessment of learning style preference.
References
Dobson, J. (2010). A comparison between learning style preferences and sex, status, and course performance. Advances in Physiological Education, 34: 197-204.
Riener, Cedar. Learning Styles: Separating Fact and Fiction. Psychology Teacher Network from the American Psychology Association Education Directorate. Winter 2010-2011. Vol 20, Issue 4.
The next article is cowritten by Neil Fleming and David Baume (a higher education consultant). The article includes claims about VARK that appear to be without evidence. In regards to the purpose of VARK, Fleming and Baume claim:
“It [VARK] can also be a catalyst for staff development – thinking about strategies for teaching different groups of learners can lead to more, and appropriate, variety of learning and teaching.”
This statement makes the claim that there are “different groups of learners” but provides no such evidence for their existence. (In fact, both this paper and the previously reviewed paper (Fleming, 1995) don’t include a single citation!) As with the last paper, it appears that the purpose here isn’t to provide evidence in support of the “learning style” but instead to publicize and encourage its use among educators.
I’m a college instructor and a trained researcher. For an assessment to be useful, it should have a handful of qualities according to research standards. Two of these qualities are validity and reliability. Validity is the idea that the questionnaire/assessment tests what it is designed to test. For example, an intelligence test that doesn’t measure intelligence is pretty useless. Here is a statement from this paper regarding the validity of the VARK questionnaire:
“We found that VARK was hard to validate statistically… we just didn’t get a good fit with the data.”
So, if the VARK questionnaire doesn’t measure preferences for modality of communication, what does it measure?
The second quality of a good questionnaire/assessment is reliability, which is basically whether individual scores are stable or fluctuate. How useful would a scale be to a dieter if it lacked reliability and every time it was used it gave a different result unrelated to the person that stepped on it? If this is the case, one might be tempted to simply keep stepping on and off the scale until they get to a number/weight that they like. This article freely admits that VARK questionnaires lack reliability and even suggests that this is a good quality:
“Some learners already know a lot about the way they learn, and need no help from any inventory or questionnaire. For others, doing the VARK questionnaire again and again over time is a worthwhile exercise, even though – maybe because – the scores may vary. VARK works when people find it useful.”
So, what can I learn from the VARK if the next time I take it, my learning preferences change? I’m all for starting a conversation about various topics, and VARK probably inspires a good conversation on the nature of learning in classrooms. Heck, it, and other learning style models, have led to a good conversation on learning theory in psychology communities (the conversation this blog was meant to summarize). But many teachers and students are taking their learning style results as gospel, changing the way the information is presented (if they are a teacher), or changing the way they interact in a classroom (if they are a student). I had a student the other day insist that they sit in the middle of the class because they are a visual learner and they would struggle in the class if they weren’t right in front of the projected notes. Sure this student may prefer to learn through visual presentation, but does that mean that preferential seating should be given to them?
As someone trained in research, the following statement caught my eye:
“When users get their results online, we ask if they think their results are a match to their own perceptions, or don’t match or they don’t know. Those figures run at 59%, 37% and 5%. I know self-perceptions don’t rate highly in research, but I would be worried if those figures were in any other order.”
Fleming and Baume are correct. Self-perceptions don’t rate high in research circles. Consider the fact that when asked about their own intelligence, 85% of people rate themselves as “above average.” Mathematical impossibilities aside, the point is that people are not usually good at judging themselves. In one of my psychology classes, I ask my students to rate themselves on a scale of 1-5 (1 = way below average, 5 = way above average, 3 = average) on various characteristics including attractiveness, physical strength, kindness, and sense of humor. They are instructed to rate themselves compared to their classmates (just in this one particular class). The results have been the same every time I have done this experiment. In all measures, the average student rating is above a 3. That is the class average is always above average. For sense of humor, the class average is usually near a 4. People are all apparently funnier than average. The other stunning thing in these data, is the complete lack of 1’s given. When self-reporting, people don’t ever like to see themselves as the worst.
What’s the point? Self-perceptions are not accurate. However, let’s assume that they are accurate. Look at their numbers: 59% match their own perceptions, 37% don’t match, and 5% don’t know whether they match. Those are not really the type of numbers that inspire huge levels of confidence in my opinion. So, point 1: the data is not useful. And point 2: even if it were useful, their data really don’t indicate that the VARK is very good.
Now, many learning styles theories have been under attack from the psychology research community over the years. To their credit, Fleming and Baume do address this:
“… it [VARK] shouldn’t be used in research; that is not its strength. Its strength lies in its educational value for helping people think about their learning in multiple ways and giving them options they might not have considered. The statistical properties are not stable enough to satisfy the requirements of research, but then, one of our findings is that no one has been able to design an instrument along these lines that does. So VARK is in good company.
Everyone who uses the VARK loves it, and that’s a great thing to be able to say. So it is obviously striking a chord with almost everyone who uses it. We just have to recognize that the constructs of learning style are too varied to pin down accurately and every instrument I’ve ever considered suffers from this same issue.”
This is a scary statement. If research doesn’t support that learning styles exist, why give resources and energy to anything learning styles related? Research should be able to shed light on learning styles. If a visual learner truly does better when presented with material visually, then conduct an experiment where you present them with material visually and aurally and compare the results. Of course, a good experiment will be more complex than that, but learning styles are not outside the realm of research.
This post is getting a little long, so here is my last piece. The following are more claims made in the paper:
“Modal preferences influence individuals’ behaviors, including learning”
“Preferences can be matched with strategies for learning. There are learning strategies that are better aligned to some modes than others. Using your weakest preferences for learning is not helpful; nor is using other students’ preferences”
“the use of learning strategies that are aligned with a modality preferences is also likely to lead to persistence learning tasks, a deeper approach to learning, active, and effective metacognition.”
“knowledge of, and acting on, one’s modal preferences is an important condition for improving one’s learning”
These claims need to be backed by evidence and in these papers no evidence is provided. Just because I prefer to learn a certain way does not necessarily translate into the idea that I learn better that particular way.
References
Fleming, N., and Baume, D. (2006) Learning Styles Again: VARKing up the right tree!, Educational Developments, SEDA Ltd, Issue 7.4, Nov. 2006, p4-7.
Fleming, N.D; (1995), I'm different; not dumb. Modes of presentation (VARK) in the tertiary classroom, in Zelmer,A., (ed.) Research and Development in Higher Education, Proceedings of the 1995 Annual Conference of the Higher Education and Research Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA),HERDSA, Volume 18, pp. 308 – 313.
Due to the extremely large number of different learning style theories out there (Coffield et al., 2004 lists over 70 different schemas/models!), my method for this blog will be to focus on one theory at a time and try and review what can be found. Some of the reviews will be entirely theoretical and others will (hopefully) be evidence based.
Due to the popularity of the auditory learner vs visual learner vs kinesthetic learner idea, I decided to start my research there. The model is officially recognized as the VARK model. The four letters of VARK stand for the four types of learners: Visual, Aural, Reading and writing, and Kinesthetic. This model of learning styles was (from what I can tell) proposed and popularized primarily by Neil Fleming. Fleming expanded on usual models by including the “R” style of learner. That is, prior to Fleming (1995) there were other theories out there, but these theories failed to include the “Reading and writing learner.” I will write more about these earlier models in later posts.
Fleming’s purpose was to develop a questionnaire to differentiate various methods of learning and to aid educators and education administrators by encouraging them to develop different modes of teaching for the various types of students in the classroom. For example, Fleming discusses two types of learners that are not served well with current educational practices:
“The third group are not well served by present day methods of teaching in a university. They are the visuals. This does not mean that they are restricted merely to picture information or enhancements using colour and layout. They like information to arrive in the form of graphs, charts, and flow diagrams.”
“In a tertiary education system we should feel sorry for the kinesthetics, who prefer their teachers to use field trips, experiments, role plays, games and experiential learning because those hands-on methods are seldom used.”
The discussion over the existence of preferences of learning styles/modes has been uncontroversial. Nearly everyone will agree that they prefer one method of instruction over another. The quotes above go one step beyond this. They seem to indicate that if a student’s preferences are not catered to (by the teacher or institution) the success of the student is jeopardized. Where is the evidence of this though?
The brief evidence that was presented included the following:
“[Two students] said that they required input from at least two modes to get a ‘full understanding’ whereas those with a strong preference usually comment that one mode is enough.”
Three case studies are also presented in the paper. Here is an example of one of them:
“Jim used the VARK questionnaire and agreed with the preference for read-write approaches to studying. He found lectures confusing and asked to be excused from attending them. Instead, he met with the teacher on a regular basis and kept track of the topics being covered. He used the library to read about the subject and claimed that he learnt more. The textbook was sufficient for a good grade (B+) in a marketing subject.”
Anecdotal evidence is never worth much. There is a reason that introspection is not a valid method of research anymore.
In all fairness, the purpose of Fleming (1995) really wasn’t to provide evidence for VARK but instead it was more of a theory paper. The paper does go a bit beyond theory when it encourages the use of their questionnaire/model in educational circles.
“Each presentation in another mode gathers in another group of students who might otherwise have missed the point of have been forced to rote learn some formulas and definitions suited to the R students. The workload for the teacher is greater but the learning for the students is better …teachers have to be aware that any one presentation of new material may be understood by only some students.”
Unfortunately, the argument for the use of this model, as presented in this particular paper, is extremely weak. While there is agreement that preferences for learning through certain modalities (V, A, R, or K) seem to exist, the idea that students get a benefit when learning through their preferred modality over any other modality is missing.
References
Coffield, F., Moseley, D., Hall, E., & Ecclestone, K. (2004). Learning styles and pedagogy in post-16 learning. A systematic and critical review. London: Learning and Skills Research Centre.
Fleming, N.D; (1995), I'm different; not dumb. Modes of presentation (VARK) in the tertiary classroom, in Zelmer,A., (ed.) Research and Development in Higher Education, Proceedings of the 1995 Annual Conference of the Higher Education and Research Development Society of Australasia (HERDSA),HERDSA, Volume 18, pp. 308 – 313
Most people have heard of learning styles. Many have probably taken an assessment to find out whether they are a visual learner or an auditory learner and so on. A few months ago, the American Psychological Association published an article in the Psychology Teacher Newsletter that contained a discussion of learning styles. In the article, Cedar Riener discusses a lack of evidence in support of learning styles. Riener even discusses negative consequences of the use of learning styles in education. Yet learning styles are still ingrained into education programs and teachers nationwide strive to integrate different methods of instruction into their classrooms in order to reach the different types of learners. A quick search for blogs on learning styles brought up two to three other blogs that were written on learning styles, all of which were focused either on the glory of learning styles or on how to apply them to classrooms settings.
A colleague of mine recently posted a few interesting remarks about learning styles as well, noting that the notion of a “learning style” does not appear in any psychology textbook including those written on the topic of learning.
So, what does the evidence out there look like? Where is the supporting evidence and where is the refuting evidence as well?
My goal with this blog is to present research reviews about learning styles. I will find any evidence based information I can and present it here.
References
Riener, Cedar. Learning Styles: Separating Fact and Fiction. Psychology Teacher Network from the American Psychology Association Education Directorate. Winter 2010-2011. Vol 20, Issue 4.
