Faculty learning styles

Abstract

Learning style is defined as an individual's preferred way of acquiring information. The purpose of this study was to determine the predominant learning styles of dental students in five consecutive classes and to determine the extent of the match or mismatch between student learning styles and faculty learning styles. Results indicate that a majority of students in the dental school classes possess one particular learning style--concrete sequential. Although slight differences did exist between the distributions of learning styles of the faculty and the dental school classes, the differences were not significant. Previous research has demonstrated that the typical dental school graduate has attributes similar to the concrete sequential learner. Based on this finding, it seems likely that most concrete sequential learners will adapt well to the private practice environment. An important question, however, is whether the contemporary dental school environment, which seems to encourage concrete sequential learning style, is conducive to the development of the intellectual and technical skills that dentists will need to practice in the 21st century.