In this study, the Approaches and Study Skills Inventory for Students (ASSIST) short form was used to gain insight about learning style characteristics that might influence students' use of an online library of plant science learning objects. This study provides evidence concerning the internal consistency reliability and construct validity of the Deep, Strategic and Surface scale scores when used to sort students' responses. Participants consisted of 446 resident university students (230 males, 216 females) in agricultural science courses with face-to-face instruction supplemented with web-based lessons. Cronbach's alphas for the three scales ranged from 0.65 to 0.75. The data file was submitted to a maximum likelihood factor analysis with oblimin rotation. When three factors were extracted, all 18 items loaded on the expected factors. One example of an analysis based on ASSIST scale scores is presented to show the potential of this procedure for helping with the interpretation of student comments.

A sample of 383 students in educational psychology classes at a large American university completed three inventories, one based on cognitive psychology, one on approaches to learning, one on autonomous studying. A series of factor analyses of items and subscales showed common emphases that transcend differences in theoretical background and terminology: effort-intensive organised study; intention to understand, personalise and integrate the information being learned; strategic or context-sensitive study behaviour; and an unselective intention to reproduce information, impervious to external cues and without personal involvement.Thomas gave permission to adapt their inventories for this study; Dr. Entwistle gave valuable suggestions at several stages of the research.Correspondence and requests for reprints should be addressed to Carol Speth,

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How can various features of internet‐based instruction be adapted to help students with different learning styles to grasp important science concepts? Are there ways of defining and measuring these differences that instructors without much background in educational psychology might find easier to apply than some of the better‐known examples? How can a better understanding of student characteristics help instructors and developers prioritize further development of internet‐based lessons? Resident students in a genetics course were required to complete internet‐based lessons originally developed for distance learning. Students who agreed to participate in this study completed the Approaches and Study Skills Inventory for Students (ASSIST), which was used to sort them into groups with similar “approaches to studying,” a concept that includes motivations (intrinsic or extrinsic), intentions (to process the information at either a deep or surface level), and whether their study methods are organized or disorganized. Later in the semester, students’ evaluations of the internet lessons were analyzed to determine how learners with different style or approach characteristics used six lesson features. This analysis, which includes five semesters of data, helped the instructor and instructional designer determine what changes would be helpful to many students, but especially those who are struggling with the concepts and not confident about their study skills or academic abilities. Additional insights came from asking students to estimate what percentage of their total learning in the course came from the internet lessons compared to lectures, labs, and other sources.

This study investigated the effects of approach to studying, gender and type of examination on test preparation strategies. Educational psychology students completed the Approaches to Studying Inventory (Entwistle and Ramsden, 1983) regarding their general learning characteristics, and thus were assigned to four approach groups. Students also answered questions about how they might study for either an essay or a multiple-choice examination. Factor analysis of those items yielded several study strategy subscales. When scores on the time-effort, integration, selection and cognitive monitoring subscales were used as dependent variables in a 4~2 x 2(cluster x gender x type of test) MANCOVA, a significant three-way interaction suggested that male and female students using different approaches react differently to multiple-choice or essay tests, and the patterns differ by strategy.In his Foreword to Entwistle and Ramsden (1983: ix), Perry recalled that researchers 40 years ago found that most college students already knew effective learning strategies (then called 'good study habits'), but relatively few practised them. Researchers around the world have been trying to answer the question, 'Why?' Some have focused on individual differences, such as academic ability, gender or learning style. Others have focused on characteristics of the learning context, such as subject-matter discipline or type of assessment.Schmeck (1983: 235) defined learning style as a relatively consistent predisposition to use a particular strategy regardless of task demands. He defined learning strategy as a pattern of information processing activities which varies according to learning task. Schmeck (1988: 171-175) suggested that a learning strategy is made up of a group of related learning tactics or study activities. Derry and Murphy (1986: 1-39) provided a useful introduction to research on training students to use specific learning strategies, but Rohwer (1984) invited educational psychologists to focus instead on the strategies which students themselves choose to employ in routine studying or preparing for examinations. J. W. Thomas and Rohwer (1986) described a model of 'autonomous studying ', and Strage, Christopoulos, Curley, Jensen and Thomas (1987) used an instrument based on this model to compare study activities in different subject areas in junior high, senior high, and college. Using their 'autonomous studying' model for thinking about learning strategies, but combining it with an individual-differences perspective, might contribute something new to our understanding of students' learning strategies.