Download Four Types of Learning Styles

Clickalong 2-3
Taking Something Practical Away from This Chapter
LEARNING THEORIES & STYLES
In a knowledge-based economy, we need to always be learning. This is true not only for
individuals but for organizations as well.
Learning is far more than just going to school. It is something we are doing
constantly. This is something managers need to consider because they are in charge of
shaping the behavior of their employees toward organizational ends.
Two Approaches to Learning that Are of Value to Managers
Learning is a more or less permanent change in behavior resulting from experience.
The behavioral change may be new skills or knowledge. The experience it results from
may be education, training, or practice. The learning, then, can affect one’s attitudes,
values, and perceptions.
How do we go about learning? Two principal approaches are operant learning
theory and social learning theory.
Operant Learning Theory: Good Behavior that’s Rewarded Is Apt to Be
Repeated. Operant learning theory suggests that behavior that has positive
consequences is more likely to be repeated and behavior that has negative
consequences is unlikely to be repeated. For example, if you’re one of those Gen Xers
who needs constant stimulation, you will be happy to continue doing a job in which your
manager provides you with the latest tools, toys, and technology for you to experiment
with. Conversely, without the reinforcement of a stimulating, challenging environment,
you may try to move on to something that looks more exciting—a new department or
employer.
The point about operant conditioning, whose foremost proponent was Harvard
psychologist B. F. Skinner, is that behavioral change is assumed to occur because of
events that happen outside of ourselves rather than inside of ourselves; the behavior is
learned rather than reflexive.i
Cognitive Learning Theory: People Behave Purposefully to Achieve LongTerm Goals. According to cognitive learning theory, people are able to act
purposefully and to choose behavior that will allow them to reach their long-term
goals. The key word here is “goal.” Cognitive learning theory suggests that people will
analyze their work situation and will make a decision about which behavior to pursue to
achieve goals such as status recognition or increased pay.
As we have seen, goal-setting techniques such as Management By Objectives are
frequently used in organizations. The advantages are that when managers and employees
set specific goals, employees are motivated to behaved in focused ways and the outcome
of their performance is explicit and measurable and can be rewarded accordingly.
If you were working as a sales rep, for example, which would you rather your
boss told you to do? (a) “You have to reduce your expenses.” Or (b) “If you reduce your
overnight travel-and-entertainment expenses by 20% during the next three months you’ll
be in line for a $300 bonus.” The first course doesn’t give you a measurable goal; the
second one does.
Four Types of Learning Styles
Educators talk about differences in learning styles--the ways in which people prefer to
learn. Some students learn well by listening to lectures. Others learn better through
reading, class discussion, hands-on experience, or researching a topic and writing about
it. Thus, your particular learning style may make you more comfortable with some kinds
of teaching and learning, and even with some kinds of subjects, than with others.
Managers need to be aware of different learning styles so that they take advantage of the
most efficient ways of transmitting knowledge and information that will help employees
benefit the organization.
There are four ways in which people can learn new material: auditory, visual,
kinesthetic, and mixed. Let's consider these. ii
Auditory Learning Style. Auditory has to do with listening and also speaking.
Auditory learners use their voices and their ears as the primary means of learning.
They recall what they hear and what they themselves express verbally.
“When something is hard to understand, they want to talk it through,” write
professors Adele Ducharme and Luck Watford of Valdosta State University in Georgia.
“When they're excited and enthusiastic about learning, they want to verbally express their
response. . . . These learners love class discussion, they grow by working and talking with
others, and they appreciate a teacher taking time to explain something to them.”iii
If you're this type of person, it’s important to know that such learners may be
easily distracted by sounds. Thus, it may be best that they not listen to the radio while
studying, because they attend to all the sounds around them. An effective study
technique, however, is to repeat something aloud several times because that helps them
memorize it. These types of learners may do well in learning foreign languages, music,
and other areas that depend on a strong auditory sense.
Visual Learning Style. Visual, of course, refers to the sense of sight. Visual
learners like to see pictures of things described or words written down. “They will
seek out illustrations, diagrams, and charts to help them understand and remember
information,” say Ducharme and Watford. “They appreciate being able to follow what a
teacher is presenting with material written on an overhead transparency or in a handout.”
For visual learners, an effective technique for reviewing and studying material
may be to read over their notes and recopy and reorganize information in outline form.
Kinesthetic Learning Style. Kinesthetic has to do with the sense of touch and of
physical manipulation. Kinesthetic learners learn best when they touch and are
physically involved in what they are studying. These are the kind of people who fidget
when they have to sit still and who express enthusiasm by jumping up and down.
“These learners want to act out a situation, to make a product, to do a project, and
in general to be busy with their learning,” say Ducharme and Watford. “They find that
when they physically do something, they understand it and they remember it.”
Mixed-Modality Learning Style. Modality means style. As you might guess,
mixed-modality learners are able to function in all three of these learning styles or
“modalities”—auditory, visual, and kinesthetic. Clearly, these people are at an
advantage because they can handle information in whatever way it is presented to them.
Learning Styles & Ways of Presenting Information. Lectures and verbal
presentations would seem to favor auditory learners. Textbooks and memos would seem
to favor visual learners. Lectures and readings are two of the principal pipelines by which
information is conveyed in college; in the organizational world, they are echoed in verbal
presentations and in memos and reports.
However, suppose one or both of these methods does not suit you? Since you
don’t usually have a choice about how a subject is taught, it’s important to get
comfortable with both methods. Both in college and in your career, this means you need
to be able to extract the most information out of a verbal presentation or written
materials—that is, take useful notes, for example—regardless of your learning preference
and the presenter’s style. It’s important that you be aware of which learning style or
styles you tend to favor so that you can take advantage of those in which you are strong
and compensate for those in which you are not so strong.
i
See B. F. Skinner, Contingencies of Reinforcement (East Norwalk, CN: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1971).
Adapted from C. Wahlstrom and B. K. Williams, Learning Success: Three Paths to Being Your Best at
College & Life, 2nd ed. (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 1999), pp. 31–34.
iii A. Ducharme and L. Watford, “Explanation of Assessment Areas” [handout], 1986.
ii