Identifying Learning Styles Among Medical Students: Does Our Assessment Favors Certain Learning Style?

ABSTRACT

Learning Style is usually identified as an individual's pattern for acquiring information. This study was used to identify the learning style of Medical students and comparing the individual Learning Styles with the Result of Annual Summative Assessment to ascertain any link. Objectives of the study were two-fold First, to identify the learning style of Medical Students for their sake and for the sake of faculty so that adequate planning in the curriculum could be done. The second aim was to search whether our Curriculum is oriented towards a particular learning style in students through comparison of learning styles with Annual Assessment Result. It was a Cross-Sectional Descriptive Study. The study was conducted among students of 3 year MBBS, Islamic International Hospital. The 80-item Honey and Mumford Learning Style Questionnaire was distributed to a class of 100 students .The result was compiled on MS Excel and compared with the results of Summative Assessment of the students. In our study, Majority of the students were Reflectors [35.5%] [n=32], followed by Reflector-Pragmatists [13.3%] [n=12]. Theorists [12.2%], Pragmatists [11%], Reflector/Theorists [8.8%] and Activists [6.6%] 34% of the students [n=31] had a combination learning style. One student had all four learning styles. Comparison of Assessment result with the result of the Questionnaire was done on an Average Reflectors have scored higher [73%] as compared to Pragmatists [72%], Theorists [71.5%] and Activists [66%]. Although no gross difference, the Assessment result on an average, was a bit higher for reflectors. This study also shows that most of the students learn more effectively from lectures, project works and independent study