Personality and approaches to learning as predictors of academic achievement

Diseth, Åge

doi:10.1002/per.469

Cited by 190 publications

(185 citation statements)

References 29 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

154

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…The results obtained for the first subscale confirm what was expected given previous research, associating deep approaches with higher academic rates (Chamorro-Premuzic & Furnham, 2008;Diseth, 2003;Duff, Boyle, Dunleavy, & Ferguson, 2004;Entwistle, 1998;Marton & Säljö, 1997;Ramsden, 1992). On the other hand, the high variability of scores of high-achieving students in the other subscales suggests that further study skills (study organization according to teachers' orientation, planning and time management, and study oriented towards evaluation) do not seem to represent characteristics to which these participants identify their study practice.…”

Section: Neo-pi-rsupporting

confidence: 78%

The relationship of personality, study practice and learning environments on excelent engineering students

Monteiro

Almeida

Cruz

et al. 2015

Análise Psicológica

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In the present study, a group of high-achieving students is characterized, and the relationship between personality traits, study practices and learning environments is explored. Thirty three engineering students with outstanding academic achievement were assessed using a mixed method approach, consisting of a semi-structured interview and two questionnaires: the NEO-PI-R (Portuguese version) and the Study Skills Scale. The resulting data indicates a convergence between qualitative and quantitative data, associating study practices with personality traits, namely consciousness and deep approach to learning and learning motivation. Participants also revealed to be work oriented, selfdisciplined, determined and highly involved with their academic work.Key words: Academic excellence, Personality, Study practice, Learning environment. IntroductionOver the past decades, a significant amount of research concerning learning and academic achievement in higher education has been developed. Such endeavour seems to result, at least in part, from the need to deal with global changes occurring in higher education in Europe. The democratization of the access to higher education led to an increasing heterogeneity of students. As a result, it became more and more important to understand the individual differences of students, such as psychological characteristics and study skills, in particular of those students who reach high achievement levels. As Shushok and Hulme (2006) state, "if you want to produce excellence, you have to study excellence. Consequently, I shifted my focus to try to understand what made top achievers tick" (p. 5).The concept of excellence, which translates the idea of superior performance in a specific field, has been studied through different approaches in the literature. Each approach presents a specific key-concept according to its respective framework; some approaches give emphasis to the psychological characteristics of excellent individuals, others are mainly focused on the behaviors and contexts of practice related with outstanding performance. There is also some divergence regarding the identification criteria, with some authors considering the performance or achievement situations (e.g., Araújo, Cruz, & Almeida, 2009;Pearse, 2000;Sękowski & Siekańska, 2008;Taylor, Gould, & Rolo, 2008), and other authors stressing the concept of talent or potential, and using cognitive measures such as the IQ (e.g., Gagné, 2004;Heller, 2004) Therefore, there is still some controversy in relation to the factors determining outstanding performance: on the one hand, there are authors who defend the role of deliberate practice and 97A correspondência relativa a este artigo deverá ser enviada para: Leandro Almeida, Departamento de Psicologia, Instituto de Educação e Psicologia, Universidade do Minho, Campus de Gualtar, 4710 Braga, Portugal. E-mail: leandro@iep.uminho.pt training (Ericsson, Nandagopal, & Roring, 2009;Nandagopal & Ericsson, 2012); on the other hand, there are authors who emphasize the role of several pers...

show abstract

Section: Neo-pi-rsupporting

confidence: 78%

The relationship of personality, study practice and learning environments on excelent engineering students

Monteiro

Almeida

Cruz

et al. 2015

Análise Psicológica

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Particular personality traits and differing learning styles seem to influence the way individuals search for information with individual studies finding marked relationships between Conscientiousness and Strategic learners; and between Openness and Deep learners (Diseth, 2003, Diseth and Martinsen, 2003, Diseth, 2011. These results are confirmed by Halder et al (2010) and Heinstrom (2002Heinstrom ( , 2006 who also concluded that Surface learners did not search thoroughly and tended to attain lower marks.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 80%

“…Bawden and Robinson's (2011) chapter on 'information styles' summarises many studies that investigated the role of learning styles, self-efficacy, and personality in terms of information-related behaviour finding many plausible and consistent relationships. Particular personality traits and differing learning styles seem to influence the way individuals search for information with individual studies finding marked relationships between Conscientiousness and Strategic learners; and between Openness and Deep learners (Diseth, 2003, Diseth and Martinsen, 2003, Diseth, 2011. These results are confirmed by Halder et al (2010) and Heinstrom (2002Heinstrom ( , 2006 who also concluded that Surface learners did not search thoroughly and tended to attain lower marks.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 80%

Profiling information behaviour of nursing students: part 2: derivation of profiles

Stokes

Urquhart

2015

Journal of Documentation

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

PurposeThe aim is to develop information behaviour profiles for nursing students, to help inform information literacy programmes. Methodology The methods include further analysis of quantitative findings (previously reported in part 1), together with qualitative research data collection and analysis. Critical incident type interviews with 11 students were transcribed and analysed using an interpretative categorisation method that used dendrograms for data display and analysis. From the regression analysis of the quantitative data, the micro-processes for information seeking were linked to learning styles, and then to personality traits to generate information seeking profiles. Integration of the qualitative findings led to development of a task-based information search model. Findings The start list of seven categories for qualitative analysis (derived from a literature review) was refined (one category added, one removed, with some relabeling). The quantitative data analysis revealed seven profiles (Deep Adventurer, Deep Identifier, Deep Investigator, Strategic All-rounder, Strategic Collector, Surface Co-ordinator, Surface Skimmer, each linked to a particular learning style, personality trait, and preferred information seeking microprocesses). Research implications/limitationsThe data was collected at only one university and the profiles and the model need to be validated with data from other groups of nursing students. The findings on micro-processes consolidate and extend previous research. Practical implications The profiles should inform information literacy programmes as they show that information search profiles may be more varied than assumed. The information search model extends previous task-based information search models. Originality The information search profiles have not been identified previously. IntroductionPart I of the paper (Stokes and Urquhart, 2011) discussed the quantitative findings of a mixed-methods doctoral research study on the development of information seeking profiles among nursing students, based on personality, self-efficacy and learning style. The quantitative element of the study used a questionnaire (sample n=194) consisting of three validated scales for personality (Saucier, 1994), learning styles (Entwistle, 1997), and self-efficacy with information literacy (Kurbanoglu et al., 2006), a section on information seeking preferences based on Foster's (2004) model, as well as some demographic questions.Bawden and Robinson's (2011) chapter on 'information styles' summarises many studies that investigated the role of learning styles, self-efficacy, and personality in terms of information-related behaviour finding many plausible and consistent relationships. Particular personality traits and differing learning styles seem to influence the way individuals search for information with individual studies finding marked relationships between Conscientiousness and Strategic learners; and between Openness and Deep learners (Diseth, 2003, Diseth and Martinsen, 2003, Diseth, 2011. These re...

show abstract

“…Biggs, 1987;Entwistle & Ramsden, 1983). A deep approach to learning has been shown to be related to high-quality learning outcomes (Diseth 2003;Watters & Watter 2007), and therefore university students are encouraged to aim at constructing meaning and develop deep understandings of the study content. However, research has shown that students vary to a great extent with regard to their approaches to learning in that some are more likely to adopt deep approaches while others will rely more on surface learning.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Explaining university students’ strong commitment to understand through individual and contextual elements

Postareff

Lindblom‐Ylänne

Parpala

2014

FLR

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Since the late 1970s numerous studies have explored students" approaches to learning (referred to as the "SAL" tradition).These studies have provided valuable evidence of students" study strategies and intentions at the university. Since extensive research already exists on students" approaches to learning, there is a need to move forward and analyse student learning from new perspectives. In the present in-depth qualitative study, we analyse interviews of 34 students who scored extremely highly on the deep approach scale in a pre-test in our previous quantitative study (Lindblom-Ylänne, Parpala & Postareff, 2013) and thus are likely to have a strong commitment to understand, and a "disposition to understand for oneself" which is a recently introduced, yet unexplored phenomenon (see Entwistle & McCune, 2009;McCune & Entwistle, 2011

show abstract

Personality and approaches to learning as predictors of academic achievement

Cited by 190 publications

References 29 publications

The relationship of personality, study practice and learning environments on excelent engineering students

The relationship of personality, study practice and learning environments on excelent engineering students

Profiling information behaviour of nursing students: part 2: derivation of profiles

Explaining university students’ strong commitment to understand through individual and contextual elements

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About