A DESCRIPTIVE STUDY TO ASSESS THE LEARNING STYLES ADOPTED BY UNDERGRADUATE NURSING STUDENTS AT SELECTED COLLEGE, BENGALURU

Background: Learning styles refer to an individuals preferred way of acquiring and processing information. Understanding a students learning style can be crucial for optimizing educational outcomes. In nursing education, catering to diverse learning preferences can enhance student engagement and prepare them for the complex demands of the profession. This study aimed to investigate the learning styles and their relationship with study variables among undergraduate nursing students.

Methods and Materials: A descriptive cross-sectional design was employed. The study was conducted at a selected college in Bangalore, India. A total of 105 undergraduate nursing students were recruited, stratified by their year of study, and selected through proportionate random sampling. Participants completed the Inventory of Learning Styles (ILS) questionnaire, which assesses four learning styles: undirected, application-directed, reproduction-directed, and meaning-directed. Additionally, data on their age, gender, marital status, place of residence, pre-university percentage, preferred medium of instruction, average study hours, and average writing assignment hours were collected. Descriptive statistics, including mean, standard deviation, frequency, and percentage, were computed for the learning style scores and demographic variables. Chi-square tests were used to analyse the association between learning styles and selected demographic variables, while Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated to examine the relationship between age and learning styles.

Results: The findings revealed that students utilized a variety of learning styles, with the majority favouring undirected (64.34%), application-directed (74.24%), reproduction-directed (63.47%), and meaning-directed (65.26%) styles. Interestingly, no significant correlation was found between age and any of the learning styles (all p-values > 0.05). Moreover, the chi-square analysis indicated an association between average hours of study and average hours of writing assignments with the reproduction-directed learning style at the 0.05 level of significance.

Conclusion: This study highlights the diverse learning preferences among undergraduate nursing students, regardless of their age. Educators in nursing programs should incorporate diverse pedagogical approaches that cater to these different styles to optimize learning outcomes and adequately prepare students for the challenges of the nursing profession. Further research with larger sample sizes could delve deeper into the factors influencing learning styles in this population and provide even more valuable insights for educational design.