The learning preferences of engineering students from two perspectives

The index of learning styles (ILS) is a self-report forced choice instrument created by Felder and Solomon which classifies the learning preferences of the respondent on four continuous scales: active/reflective; sensing/intuition; visual/verbal; and sequential/global. The ILS, although still under development, has already yielded insights into the learning preferences of engineering students and has shown significant differences between the average responses both of male and female students and also of first-year and fourth-year students. Additionally, a large group of engineering students at The University of Western Ontario (UWO), Canada, has completed both the ILS and also the well-known Myers-Briggs type indicator (MBTI). This UWO data reveals some strong connections between three of the ILS learning preference scales and the MBTI dimensions of psychological type. This paper presents the responses of engineering students to both the ILS and also to the MBTI. It also summarises the significant ILS response differences for male/female students, for first-year/fourth-year students and for students of different personality type on each of the four MBTI dimensions.