PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE 1

Personality Type as an Indicator of Learning Style

Jenna Melvin

University of Rochester

Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning

PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE 2

Introduction

Looking at differences in human behavior, many researchers have used personality type

as a measure to attempt to explain these behavioral differences. One common way to identify

and categorize people’s personality types is by using a personality inventory which identifies

individuals’ preferences within a number of dichotomies and determines their overall personality

type. Applying results from these personality inventories and comparing them to other measures

has been the basis of much research. Vornberg and Huffty (1981) connected personality type

with leadership style and attitude toward women. Leonard, Scholl, and Kowalski (1999)

compared personality type to information processing style. Goodstein and Lanyon (1999)

related personality type to employees’ performance and success in the workplace.

In this study, data was collected in order to determine whether or not there is any

connection between personality type and preferred learning style. The four dichotomies

represented in the analysis of personality types are Extraversion vs. Introversion, Sensing vs.

Intuition, Thinking vs. Feeling, and Judging vs. Perceiving. The four scales represented in the

analysis of learning styles are Active vs. Reflective learning, Sensing vs. Intuitive learning,

Visual vs. Verbal learning, and Sequential vs. Global learning. These two inventories were

chosen because based on the information provided by The Myers & Briggs Foundation and

Soloman and Felder, there appears to be a logical one-to-one correspondence between the items

in each, illustrated in the table below. It was hypothesized that a given preference in one’s

personality type would predict a certain preference in one’s learning style in accordance with the

comparison table.
PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE
Personality Type1
Extravert
*I like getting my energy from active involvement
in events
*I often understand a problem better when I can
talk out loud about it and hear what others have to
say
Introvert
*I take time to reflect so that I have a clear idea of
what I’ll be doing when I decide to act
*I often prefer doing things alone or with one or
two people I feel comfortable with
Sensing
*I notice facts and I remember details that are
important to me.
*I like to see the practical use of things and learn
best when I see how to use what I’m learning.
Intuitive
*I’m interested in new things and what might be
possible
*I like to work with symbols or abstract theories
Thinking
*I like to find the basic truth or principle to be
applied
*I look for logical explanations
Feeling
*I believe I can make the best decisions by
weighing what people care about and the points-
of-view of persons involved in a situation
Judging
*I seem to prefer a planned or orderly way of life
and like to have things settled and organized
Perceiving
*I seem to prefer a flexible and spontaneous way
of life, and I like to understand and adapt to the
world rather than organize it
1
Information taken from MBTI basics (The Myers & Briggs Foundation)
2
Information taken from Learning styles and strategies (Soloman & Felder)
3
Learning Style2
Active
*Active learners tend to retain and understand
information best by doing something active with
it--discussing or applying it or explaining it to
others
Reflective
*Reflective learners prefer to think about it
quietly first
*Prefer working alone
Sensing
*Sensing learners tend to like learning facts and
be patient with details
*Sensors tend to be more practical and careful
Intuitive
*Intuitive learners often prefer discovering
possibilities and relationships
*Often more comfortable with abstractions and
mathematical formulations
Verbal
*Verbal learners get more out of words--written
and spoken explanations
Visual
*Visual learners remember best what they see--
pictures, diagrams, flow charts, time lines, films,
and demonstrations
Sequential
*Sequential learners tend to follow logical
stepwise paths in finding solutions
Global
*Global learners tend to learn in large jumps,
absorbing material almost randomly without
seeing connections, and then suddenly "getting it."
PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE 4

Hypotheses

1. An extroverted personality will predict an active learning style, while an introverted

learning style will predict a reflective learning style.

2. A sensing personality will predict a sensing learning style, while an intuitive personality

will predict an intuitive learning style.

3. A thinking personality will predict a verbal learning style, while a feeling personality will

predict a visual learning style.

4. A judging personality will predict a sequential learning style, while a perceiving

personality will predict a global learning style.

Methods

Surveys

The Jung Typology Test was used to determine participants’ personality types

(HumanMetrics, 2013). The inventory consists of 72 general statements to which participants

answered “yes” or “no” based on whether or not they felt the statement reflected their

personality. Personality types given by this test identify one’s preferences for each of the four

dichotomies outlined previously. Along with participants’ personality types, the degree (percent)

to which they preferred each dichotomy was also recorded. This showed whether they slightly

preferred one over the other or had a strong preference for one over the other. Since it is possible

for anyone to fall anywhere on the scale (and one is rarely ever completely at one extreme), this

additional information allowed this fact to be considered during analysis.

The Index of Learning Styles Questionnaire from North Carolina State University was

used to determine participants’ preferred learning styles (Soloman & Felder). The questionnaire

consists of 44 questions, each with two possible answers. Participants selected the answer that
PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE 5

they felt best reflected their learning style. Learning style preferences were displayed along four

scales, one for each of the pairs of learning styles mentioned previously. Scales ranged from 1-

11. As with the personality type results, both the learning style preferences and the degree to

which participants preferred each were recorded.

Collecting Responses

All participants in this study were undergraduate students at the University of Rochester.

Both surveys were completed and scored online on the websites where they are available. Links

to the surveys were distributed to students via email and were made available online on

University of Rochester class social media pages. Results were obtained by participants and

submitted to the study.

Results

A total of 52 responses were collected for analysis. The bar graphs below visually

represent the distribution of responses for general comparison. In order to test whether or not the

participants’ preferred learning styles were dependent on their indicated personality type, the

results were placed into contingency tables and a chi-square test was performed on each set of

data. For each set, the null hypothesis was that preferred learning style is independent of

personality type, and the alternative hypothesis was that preferred learning style is dependent

upon personality type. The results of each chi-square test can be seen next to the corresponding

table. High chi-square values and low p values would lead to the rejection of the null hypothesis,

meaning the learning style was dependent on personality type. The only set of data for which the

null hypothesis is rejected is the set that tests the dependence of an active or reflective learning

style on an extraverted or introverted personality type. According to the analysis, there is

sufficient evidence to support the claim that these learning styles are dependent upon one’s
 PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE 6

Personality Type Personality Type

Preferred Learning Style Extravert Introvert TOTAL Preferred Learning Style Sensing Intuitive TOTAL
2
14 8 22 χ =19.34 14 18 32 χ2=0.39
Active -5
Sensing
11 11 p=1.10x10 16 16 p=0.53
2 28 30 df=1 7 13 20 df=1
Reflective Intuitive
15 15 10 10
TOTAL 16 36 52 TOTAL 21 31 52

Personality Type Personality Type

Preferred Learning Style Thinking Feeling TOTAL Preferred Learning Style Judging Perceiving TOTAL
6 10 16 χ2=0.42 24 4 28 χ2=0.45
Verbal Sequential
8 8 p=0.51 14 14 p=0.50
17 19 36 df=1 22 2 24 df=1
Visual Global
18 18 12 12
TOTAL 23 29 52 TOTAL 46 6 52
PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE 7

personality type; specifically, an introverted personality predicts a reflective learning style, and

an extraverted personality predicts an active learning style. However, the results of the other

three analyses do not provide sufficient evidence that specific learning styles are dependent upon

specific personality types. Since both the personality and learning styles inventories give results

that could fall anywhere on a very wide scale, the percentages that participants preferred one end

over the other. In order to see if dependency was more apparent when only those with a

significant preference were analyzed, only those personality types with a 50% preference or

greater and those learning styles with a preference of 5 or greater were put into analysis tables.

However, numbers were too small for any analysis to be done (many tables had cells with only

two or three data points). Therefore, this data is not included in the results.

Discussion

These results support Hypothesis 1 of this study but do not support Hypotheses 2-4. It

appears to be the case that learning style is not completely dependent on personality type.

Rather, specific learning styles are more dominant for certain personality types while other

learning styles are used equally by both personality types. Specifically, this study found that

extraverts are primarily active learners while introverts are primarily reflective learners. This

result is not surprising. Many people are aware of whether they are extraverted or introverted,

and this aspect of personality tends to carry over accordingly into many areas of a person’s life.

However, it is also not surprising that people rely on both learning styles in a given category.

They are by no means exclusive, and nobody learns every subject exactly the same way.

Soloman and Felder mention in their Learning styles and strategies that people use one style

sometimes and the other at other times. Nevertheless, while these results did not show that these

learning styles were dependent on the personality, the p value given by each of those chi-square
PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE 8

tests was around 0.5. This is not such an extremely high p value that it completely rules out the

possibility of dependence. There was not a very large amount of data collected, nor was there an

extremely even distribution among the data that was collected. Because of this, considerations

for improvement and further study are included below.

Considerations for Further Study

1. Repeat this study as conducted here, but gather a much larger amount of data; there may

have simply been insufficient data to show dependence, such as the case of only having

six participants with a perceiving personality.

2. Conduct this study including students from a variety of universities; certain personality

types or learning styles may be more common within a single university, skewing the

data.

3. Conduct this study using a different personality inventory; this test only covers eight

possible personality types, where other tests may cover more, different aspects of

personality that may be more related to learning style. The results of Myers-Briggs type

tests may not be the best means of predicting other behaviors (Pittenger, 1993).

Conclusion

The findings of this study suggest that it is appropriate and effective to include a variety of

learning styles in education. If most personality types benefit from multiple learning styles, there

is no reason to limit students. However, these results do suggest that if you know that you are

working with a group full of extraverted or introverted students, it would be beneficial for you to

gear the learning towards their active or reflective learning style, respectively.
PERSONALITY TYPE AS AN INDICATOR OF LEARNING STYLE 9

References

HumanMetrics. (2013). Jung typology test. Retrieved from http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-

win/JTypes2.asp

Goodstein, L. D., & Lanyon, R. I. (1999, September). Applications of personality assessment to

the workplace: a review. Journal of Business and Psychology, 13(3), 291-322.

Leonard, N. H., Scholl, R. W., & Kowalski, K. B. (1999, May). Information processing style

and decision making. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 20(3), 407-420.

Pittenger, D. J. (1993). The utility of the myers-briggs type indicator. Review of Educational

Research, 63(4), 467-488.

Soloman, B.A., & Felder, R.M. Index of learning styles questionnaire. Retrieved from

http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/learningstyles/ilsweb.html

Soloman, B.A., & Felder, R.M. Learning styles and strategies. Retrieved from

http://www4.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/ILSdir/styles.htm

The Myers & Briggs Foundation. MBTI basics. Retrieved from

http://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-personality-type/mbti-basics/

Vornberg, J. A., & Huffty, J. (1981, September). Personality, leadership style, and

superintendents' attitudes toward women. The Phi Delta Kappan, 63(1), 68.