Influence Of Fleming’s Vark Learning Styles On Student Radiographers’ Competency In Lumbar Spine Imaging

Abstract

\n Background: The relationship between student learning styles and academic achievement has been investigated within different academic contexts. However, the relationship between learning styles and students performance in the professional context of radiography hasn’t received the needed attention and is very much evident based on the absence of an established study approach that ensures achievement of clinical competences. A cross-sectional experimental study design was initially employed to determine students’ learning preferences. A multi-modal teaching approach of a clinical procedure (specifically lumbar spine imaging) was then taught to all the students by a qualified clinical tutor via their disclosed learning preferences. Finally, the students were examined clinically by a clinical supervisor who was blinded to the learning preferences of these students and the results were analyzed to conclude on the best approach to learning the clinical practice.Results: Among the respondents, 58.1% preferred the multimodal (dual, trimodal and quadrimodal) learning styles while 41.9% preferred one dominant learning style: Kinesthetic (K), Read and Write (R), Auditory (A) and Visual (V). The Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) revealed no significant difference between different learning styles and student performance in clinical practice. Thus, there was no significant correlation between the clinical competencies of the different learning style groupings. Conclusion: The study provided evidence that multimodal learners had more flexible learning approaches than those with single preferences, thus informing radiography educators on the importance of using varied and flexible pedagogy for effective integration of theory and practice.