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Frontier of Higher Education | Volume 2 | Issue 1 | March 2020
1. Literature Review
D
efinition learning styles are internally based
characteristics of individual for the intake
or understanding of new information
[1]
(Reid, 1995). The term learning style represents the
general approaches preferred by the students when
they study. Students themselves get used to applying
their own learning styles in comfort zone. In L2 learn-
ing, comfort zone would be learning situations that fits
students
爷
learning preferences. So learning style here
refers to "an individual
爷
s natural, habitual, and pre-
ferred ways of absorbing, processing, and retaining
new information and skills."(Reid,1995) and Keefe de-
fines "learning styles are characteristic cognitive, af-
fective, and physiological behaviours that serve as rel-
atively stable indicators of how learners perceive, in-
teract with, and respond to the learning environment...
Learning style is a consist way of functioning, that re-
flects the underlying causes of learning behaviour."
[2]
(1979).
Learning style is an overall pattern that provides
learners different methods to grasp knowledge. And
the same learning style can be loved or hated by differ-
ent people. Kolb thinks that learning can be classified
into four parts, concrete experience, reflective obser-
vation, abstract conceptualization and active experi-
mentation. Students would have partiality for these
four processes. Therefore, it leads to four types of
learning style preference: diverging which combines
preferences for experiencing and reflecting, assimilat-
ing which combines preferences for reflecting and
thinking, converging which combines preference for
thinking and doing and accommodating which com-
bines preference for doing and experiencing.
[3]
(2005)
And Reiff
[4]
(1992) thinks that learning styles can
be divided into five categories: environmental ele-
ments (sound, light, temperature, design), emotional el-
ements (motivation, persistence, responsibility), socio-
logical elements ( self, partner, mentor), and psycho-
logical elements (global-analytical, impulsive-reflec-
tive). Some are stable that can not change while some
can be trained and change in different environment.
What
爷
s more, Rebecca L. Oxford proposes that
"Within the area of learning style, each individual re
flects sensory style dimensions (visual/auditory/hands-
A Case Study of a Chinese learner’s Learning Style in English Studying
Mi Zhang
(Rongzhi College of Chongqing Technology and Business University, 401320, China)
Abstract:
This essay focus on the second language learning styles of a L2 learner, utilizing Learning style survey, designed by Andrew
D. Cohen, Rebecca L.Oxford and Julie C.Chi, and self-designed interview. The data have indicated that the learner
爷
s learning style re-
mained relatively constant throughout his time in language studying, but it would change in different environment, in different stages of
learning English. And his learning style is related to his reading.
This essay is organized as follows. Section 2 gives a brief overview of learning styles. In section 3, it proposes research questions
that would be investigated in this report. And section 4 and 5 provide methodology and information of participant. Section 6 presents
the data and results. And section 7 considers these results with previous findings. Section 8 concludes this report.
Keywords:
learning style; L2 learner; learning style preferences
DOI:
10.36012/fhe.v2i1.1571
30
on) and social style dimensions (extroverted/introvert-
ed)." and it also has cognitive style dimensions, which
are concrete-sequential/abstract-intuitive, closure-ori-
ented/open, detail-focused/holistic (sometimes called
particular/global), and analyzing/synthesizing.
[5]
(2003)
Different learner types are believed to exist. And
since the late 20
th
century, researchers and educators
have designed some instruments to assess learning
styles.
[6]
(Dunn,1984). Ehrman & Leaver have estab-
lished a "learner profile schema usable for diagnosis
and advising language learners with ten cognitive style
dimensions. Most of them well-known (e.g. field inde-
pendence, leveling-sharpening, random-sequential)."
and during their research, they find many crucial con-
clusions, like Field independence as learning style,
prefers to separate what is considered important from
text, while field dependence would focus on the whole
context. Random learners would like to work out their
own learning sequences while sequential learners
would learn step-by-step.
[7]
(Ehrman & Leaver,2003)
and there are some other conclusions about the differ-
ent learning styles.
And in Reid
爷
s research, she thinks that people
learn through their sensory and everyone has their own
preferences. Reid also points that "General speaking,
the results of this study showed that ESL students
strongly preferred kinesthetic and tactile learning
styles." and "Graduate students indicated a significant-
ly greater preference for visual and tactile learning
than undergraduates."
[8]
(1987) and Carbo(1983) thinks
that good learners prefer to learn through their visual
and auditory senses while poor readers have a stronger
preference for tactile and kinesthetic learning.
And there are still many instruments designed to
assess learning styles. Although many instruments are
different, they share the same goal of identifying the
nature of individual difference in learning.
2. Research Questions
This study aims at investigating the language learning
style preferences of a Chinese EFL learner and tries to
figure out if his learning styles would be different dur-
ing his different stage, time and process of learning, if
his learning style is related to reading.
3. Methodology
The study reported here uses Julie C. Chi, Rebecca
Oxford, Andrew Co hen
爷
s Learning Style Survey
which assess learners
爷
general approach to learning.
This survey does not predict learners
爷
behavior in ev-
ery instance, but gives a clear indication of students
爷
own learning preference. And this survey gives specif-
ic descriptions about each learning preference which
helps learners to take advantages of ways they learn
best. The way to research is to give participant about
30 minutes to complete the survey, and then total the
points in each part, write the results in the blanks and
circle the higher number in each part. If points are
close, both aspects of styles should be circled. At the
Note part, it gives directions and explanations about
every style preference. Using these explanations helps
to understand and investigate participant
爷
s learning
styles.
In addition, participant would also take an inter-
view which draws on participant
爷
s conscious knowl-
edge and perceptions of learning styles. The author
gathered information from several open-ended, learn-
ing-related interviews with participant. And then au-
thor tries to link information from interview with re-
sults from Learning Style Survey. And by comparing
with the previous findings, author gets general conclu-
sion.
4. Participant
The participant in this study is a 25-year-old man from
China. F (pseudonym) began to study English in junior
school. And in the later few years in the high school
and university, he continued to learn English in daily
classes. And after he graduated in 2012, he had
worked for an advertising agency for about 3 years. He
had never gone abroad to work, study or live. Every-
day he getting in touch with is a pure Chinese-lan-
guage environment. After he resigned, he took some
English classes again to prepare IELTS test (Interna-
tional English Language Testing Systems). And now
he is a postgraduate in the University of Essex.
5. Data analysis and results
Here the Learning Style Survey provides evidences
about F
爷
s learning styles. In the first part How I use
my physical senses. It has thirty statements, and every
ten statements refer to an aspect of sensory learning
styles. First is visual, second is auditory and the third is
tactile/kinesthetic. And F gets 27, 23, 26 in order. Ac-
cording to the scores he gets, his sensory style prefer-
ences are visual and tactile/kinesthetic. And in the in-
School Building
31
Frontier of Higher Education | Volume 2 | Issue 1 | March 2020
terview, when I asked him about "Do you think which
way is easy to understand new knowledge, through
you eyes? Ears? Or hands?" He replied me that he
likes learning by seeing which makes impression on
him.
In the part 2 How I expose myself to learning sit-
uations, it provides twelve statements about different
situations. The score in the first half which refers to
extraverted style is 16, while the score in another part
which refers to introverted style is 14. It means that F
would expose himself to learning situations in an ex-
traverted way. At the same time, he said he is an out-
going person. When he feels stressed, he would "Eat
chocolate, walk around, go to the party" and "would
not stay at home alone".
In the part 3 How I handle possibilities, it also has
two parts A and B, and F gets 20 in A and 13 in B.
Here A represents random-intuitive and B represents
concrete-sequential. What
爷
s more, when I asked him
about "How do you learn? On your own sequences or
follow the guide from teachers and learn step-by-step?"
His answer is that he has his own plan and would fol-
low his own step.
In the part 4 How I deal with ambiguity and with
deadlines, it has eight statements about this part. And
the first four refers to closure-oriented learning and the
last four refers to open learning style. And F gets 12 in
the first part and 8 in another. So the result shows that
he is closure-oriented. In the interview he expressed
that most time before he would study, he prefers to
make a plan, about how to start, when to do tasks and
when to finish it.
In the part 5 How I receive information, this part
refers to global and particular learning styles. And F
gets the same scores 12 in part A and B. It seems that
he is neutral in the survey here. But later in the inter-
view, he acted to be more global. I asked him about
how he would do when reading. Would he focus on
the whole context or on the details? He said that most
of time he would pay much attention to the general
ideas. Even sometimes there are some words or sen-
tences he could not understand, he would not care
about these. He would skip it or use contextual clues
to the meaning. And I also gave him a question about
what will he see first about the forest and trees. And
the answer is he would see fore st at first. And this
question also relates to Part 9 about How I deal with
multiple inputs. He also gets the same scores 9 and 9
in these two parts. But according to his answer about
seeing forest first and focusing on the whole context, it
shows that he is filed-dependent.
In the part 6 How I further process information, it
also has ten statements which are divided into two
parts: synthesizing and analytic. The score F gets in the
part A is twice as much as that of part B. Besides, he
told me that when he reads articles in daily life or
works, he prefers to use pieces to build new models
and tries to get new idea or information from this arti-
cle. He enjoys guessing the meaning of unknown
words. There is no particular reason that forces him to
act like this way, it is just his habit. He gets used to do-
ing in this way. The result in Learning Style Survey is
corresponding to the conclusion from the interview: F
tends to be synthesizing.
In the part 7 How I commit material to memory,
he gets the same scores in these two sections once a-
gain. But according to the interview, his answers about
"when you learn new materials, will you connect these
with previous knowledge or make distinctions?" and
"What would you be more focused, the accuracy of
knowledge or the expediency of knowledge?" reveal
that he is a leveler. And the following is his answers:
"In most cases, I am willing to use my previous knowl-
edge to understand the new input. I think it can help
me to understand better and I can remember new
knowledge very well. If you give me a choose about
the accuracy and expediency of the knowledge, I
would choose the later one which can broaden my
horizon."
In the part 8 How I deal with language rules, it
contains two aspects: inductive and deductive. And F
gets 8 in inductive and 6 in deductive. This result con-
forms to the interview. He said he prefers the teaching
way that teachers can give a lot of examples and he
can find rules by himself, rather than the way that
teachers give rules in advance and he applies these
rules into practice.
In the part 10 How I deal with response time, F
gets 10 in impulsive part and 8 in reflective part. It
shows that he is impulsive. And during the whole in-
terview, he reacted very quickly and didn
爷
t spend too
much time thinking. And these two results all say he is
an impulsive person.
And in the last part 11 How literally I take reality,
32
F gets 5 in metaphoric part and 7 in literal part. In the
interview, I asked him "when learning English, what
do you prefer? Learning materials that are given or
Learning and trying to understand the whole grammar
system or other information involved?" and he replies
quickly: "of course I like to learn material that are giv-
en which can not only save my time, but become easi-
er for me to grasp new knowledge."
And in the later interview, I asked him whether
his learning habits changes in his different stages of
learning English. He indicated that only some of his
learning habits change as he gets older. Like in the
past, he often finished his homework alone but now he
likes to study in groups which give him space to dis-
cuss and analysis some questions. And when he was
young, he may felt shy to answer teacher
爷
s questions.
But now, he is confident in raising questions and doing
presentations in class. The reason why his learning
styles change is that he is exposed to different learning
environments and he has more experience: working
and studying. It forces him to change some habits.
6. Discussion
To sum up, as indicated by Learning Style Survey, F
爷
s
learning style is visual, tactile/kinesthetic, extraverted,
random-intuitive, closure-oriented, global, synthesiz-
ing, inductive, field-dependent, impulsive and literal.
He is also a leveler. Some of his learning style changes
during his different stages. He also has his own plan,
own methods, and own reading preferences in English
studying. And the interview supports the results of the
survey.
According to the literature, Keefe thinks that
"learning styles serve as relatively stable indicators of
how learners perceive, interact with, and respond to
the learning environment."
[9]
(1979) Learners
爷
learning
style is habitual that seldom changes during one
爷
s life.
But we can not ignore the influence of the environ-
ment. Keefe also says that "Learning style is a consist
way of functioning, that reflects the underlying causes
of learning behaviour." (1979) it means that learning
style reflects learning behavior. So under some reasons
caused by environment or one
爷
s own experience,
learning style can slightly change. And according to
the self-assessment of F, he does think some of his be-
haviors change. And Cheng and Banya hold the view
that "some (learning styles) are biological and stable,
such as individual
爷
s response to sound, light, and tem-
perature. Others are developmental and flexible, such
as perceptual preferences, motivation and reflectivity;
that is, they can be trained and extended." What
爷
s
more, Joy Reid points that "Learning styles are a result
of both nature and nurture."
[10]
(1998) Samuel Messick
also reports that different individuals perform the same
task in different ways, and that the same individual
might perform in a different manner across items or on
different occasions.
[11]
(1976) Therefore, F
爷
s learning
style is changeable through his different time of learn-
ing English. This conclusion is corresponded to previ-
ous findings.
And in the Marian Tyacke
爷
s research, there are
two kind of students, one is "more inclined to use their
reasoning and analytical skills, make conscious choic-
es, compare and select, then retain or discard informa-
tion." another "read more quickly and extensively, but
may be inaccurate answering questions about details.
"and the result is that the former group may appear to be
more successful in traditional assessment situations.
[12]
(1998) Turning to the interview which relates to the
reading, it embodies the same finding. F got 6.5 in the
IELTS test reading part which can not be regarded to
have a high level of competence of English. F said that
during taking reading test in IELTS, he read quickly in
order to finish all the questions in a limited time. In
reading part, it has various types: short answer ques-
tions, sentence completion, multiple choice, matching
headings to sections, gap fill and so on. Most of these
requires accurate details not general ideas. So F can
understand what each articles talk about, but still lost
some points. At the same time, according to the sur-
vey, F is global, synthesizing, and field-dependent that
will pay much attention to the whole context and ig-
nore some specific details.
[13]
(Ehrman & Leaver,2003)
it might be argued that learning style here he obtains
can not be regarded as factor which could influence
reading scores. Because the proficiency, the status of
taking exams can also influence the results. Crucially,
however, learning style here is not thought to be the
only factor that relates to reading. It is habitual behav-
ior that could happen unconsciously during his study-
ing, his reading.
7. Conclusion
In this report, by combining Language Learning Sur-
vey and self-designed interview, we can know partici-
pant F
爷
s learning style. And his learning style changes
School Building
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Frontier of Higher Education | Volume 2 | Issue 1 | March 2020
with the time and environment. At the same time, his
learning style, such as global, field-dependent, and
synthesizing style, influences his reading in daily study
or in the test.
Importantly, however, the survey here can not
present the accurate learning style F has, it is the gen-
eral assessment. And the factors that will influence
reading achievement are variable, such as learning
strategies, learning belief, learning aptitude and so on.
In the further study, we should try to connect these fac-
tors to investigate what is also related to English read-
ing for L2 learners, and what degree do these factors
function.
References
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[2] Keefe, J. W. 1979. "Learning Style: an overview." In
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[3] Kolb, Alice Y. & David A. Kolb. 2005. The Kolb Learning
Style Inventory-Version 3.1 2005 Technical Specifications,
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[4] Reiff, J. 1992. What research says to the teacher: Learning
styles. Washington, DC: National Education Association.
[5] Oxford, Rebecca. Language Learning Styles and Strategies:
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[6] Duun, R.1984. Learning styles: State of the science theory
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[7] Ehrman, Madeline & Leaver, Betty Lou. 2003. Cognitive
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[8] Reid, Joy M. 1987. The Learning Style Preferences of ESL
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[9] Keefe, J. W. 1979. "Learning Style: an overview." In
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[10] Cheng, Maria Hsueh-Yu. & Banya, Kingsley. 1998.
耶
Bridging the Gap Between Teaching Style and Learning
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[11] Messick, S. 1976. Personality consistences in cognition and
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[12] Tyacke, Marian. (1998)
耶
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