Learning style based individualized adaptive e-learning environments: Content analysis of the articles published from 2005 to 2014

Traditional online learning environments generally use a one-size-fits-all approach, neglecting individual learner needs, goals, and cognitive abilities. Adaptive Educational Hypermedia (AEH) systems emerged to address this by personalizing learning content based on user profiles. The Adaptive Learning System is a computerized system developed to enhance digital interactive educational content teaching and learning. The system’s Adaptive algorithm automatically detects learners’ strengths and weaknesses through the adaptation process and provides personalized learning materials, feedback, and guidance during their learning. Adaptive content allows learners to learn the material at their own pace while providing additional support, evaluation, and resources tailored to each learner. In traditional educational systems, every student is given access to the same learning content regardless of their individual learning needs. Higher education institutions face various challenges when testing and implementing adaptive learning systems for their domain of knowledge. Issues related to technical challenges include processing real-time data, difficulties consolidating learning concepts and solutions into existing learning management systems, and the complexity, ease of use, and usability of adaptive learning systems. However, despite the advancement and technical sophistication in adaptive algorithms, most AEH systems still face significant usability challenges. Learners often struggle with complex interfaces, limited system responsiveness, and poor adaptation to diverse demographics and subject backgrounds. Consequently, the current adaptive systems are underutilized in higher education, with limited empirical evidence on their effectiveness in enhancing student engagement, engagement, quality of experience (QoE), and academic performance. While foundational research work (Brusilovsky, 2001; De Bra et al., 2013) and recent studies (Liu & Lim, 2020; colMOOC project) have shown the importance of adaptive educational hypermedia, yet ongoing issues persist regarding usability, learner control (Paramythis & Loidl-Reisinger, 2004), and empirical validation across varied higher education settings (Latham et al., 2004; Educause, 2018). Systematic investigations into user-controllable personalization and its effects on inclusivity and academic achievement remain limited (Xie et al., 2019; Lundqvist; Warburton, 2019). Furthermore, Li et al. (2021) highlighted that existing systems lack comprehensive cognitive modelling and fail to adequately adapt to individual learner dispositions, which restricts their intelligence and adaptability. This complexity in adaptive systems continues to pose challenges for education overall, as emphasized by Fengying Li, Yifeng He, and Qingshui Xue (2021). Addressing these issues, Dubiel et al. (2022) propose a framework for adaptive user interfaces that integrates the interaction environment to enhance system responsiveness. Therefore, there remains a significant gap in the literature regarding the lack of empirical evaluation of user-controlled personalization, particularly in real-world, multi-disciplinary higher education contexts. Existing research has focused mainly on adaptive algorithmic and technical development, but has not given sufficient attention to practical usability (the lack of effective, usable AEH systems, learner diversity, and actual learner-centered outcomes). Moreover, there is a lack of comprehensive frameworks for evaluating the usability of adaptive educational hypermedia (AEH), and there is limited research on how these adaptive systems can foster inclusivity and fairness among diverse learner populations. Therefore, there is an urgent need to address the usability and complexity problems in AEH systems and to suggest the creation of usable, effective, personalised, learner-centric, and user-controllable AEH systems for higher education environments. This research study addresses these gaps by introducing a personalized, user-controllable Adaptive Educational Hypermedia (AEH) framework specially designed for a Higher Education setting. It evaluates multiple versions of adaptive learning systems across multiple disciplines (English, Malay, Computer Science) revealing significant enhancements in both student achievement and satisfaction. The study not only evaluates multiple versions of adaptive systems but also offers practical recommendations for software developers and educators seeking to implement effective, more intuitive, and learner-centric adaptive systems within real higher educational environments. By exploring the relationships between learner demographics, usability, and academic outcomes, the study promotes inclusivity and equity in digital education. More specifically, it introduces a novel user-controllable personalization feature that empowers learners to customize the learning content to improve their adaptive learning experience, addressing a major limitation found in existing systems. The findings demonstrate significant improvements in student performance and satisfaction with the system’s interface, thereby enhancing subject retention, confirming that adaptive learning systems can effectively improve the academic experience in higher education environments.

Technology, learning environment, and e-sources have shifted learners’ learning styles in academic reading courses. The study aimed to explore tertiary Indonesian EFL learners’ learning styles in reading hypermedia material since it benefits teachers in determining teaching approaches, assessments, and tasks in teaching reading courses. This study answered the research questions about tertiary Indonesian EFL learners’ learning styles and gender differences in their learning styles in reading hypermedia material., Seventy-one first-grade learners were selected randomly as the sample from the 141 learners who enrolled in the Academic Reading course. The four types of learning styles, concrete, analytical, communicative, and authority-oriented, were employed as the categories in this study. Descriptive statistics and t-tests were applied for the data analysis. The study revealed that the tertiary EFL learners’ learning styles were concrete and authority-oriented. Concrete and authority-oriented styles were the highest, the communicative style was the second, and the analytical style was the lowest. The t-test result showed no significant difference in learning styles between gender. The successful implementation of this descriptive quantitative research and the design of research instruments for learning styles contribute to expanding the research methodology in this digital era. The research result can help tertiary Indonesian EFL learners understand their learning styles. It also allows teachers to develop classroom activities, tasks, reading material, and media. Specifically, the use of hypermedia material and the changes in the learning environment mode has changed learners’ learning styles in Reading courses, which lead to a change in teachers’ teaching approaches.

This study explored the learning styles prevalent among high and low achievers in 14 public and independent senior secondary schools in Lagos State, Nigeria. The study utilised a survey design to elicit information from 414 participants across three local government areas of the state, using a random sampling technique and the English Language Achievement Test (ELAT) instrument. The collected data were analysed using t-test analysis. The findings showed no significant difference in the learning style preferences of high and low achieving students in secondary schools for visual and auditory styles, while there was a significant difference in tactile learning style. Low achievers had a higher preference for the tactile learning style (M = 17.96) than high achievers (M = 16.24). The study also revealed that the most prevalent learning style among high and low achieving students in public and independent secondary schools is visual, followed by auditory, while tactile/kinesthetic is the least prevalent learning style. Based on the findings in this study, a number of recommendations were articulated for teachers, curriculum developers and learners.

هدفت هذه الدراسة إلى تقييم الطلاب لأنماط التعلم المفضلة لديهم في کلية التربية والآداب بجامعة تبوک وعلاقة ذلک بمتغير جنس الطالب؛ إضافة إلى معرفة الفروق بين الطلاب العاديين والمتفوقين في أنماط التعلم المفضلة لديهم، تکونت عينة الدراسة من (216) طالبا وطالبة من المرحلة الجامعية الأولى (البکالوريوس) في کلية التربية والآداب في جامعة تبوک، حيث قام الباحث بتطوير مقياس لتقييم أنماط التعلم يتمتع بخصائص سيکومترية مناسبة، دلت نتائج الدراسة على أن بعد التعلم البصري قد جاء بالمرتبة الأولى من بين أبعاد أنماط التعلم الأخرى، يليه بعد التعلم الفردي، بينما جاء نمط التعلم الجمعي في المرتبة الأخيرة، کما بينت نتائج الدراسة على وجود فروق ذات دلالة إحصائية في نمط التعلم الفردي والتعلم البصري تبعا لمتغير جنس الطالب لصالح الإناث، بينما لايوجد فروق ذات دلالة إحصائية في أنماط التعلم الأخرى بين الذکور والإناث. من جهة أخرى فقد بينت نتائج الدراسة على وجود فروق ذات دلالة إحصائية في نمط التعلم الحرکي والتعلم البصري تبعا لمتغير التفوق لصالح الطلاب المتفوقين، في حين لايوجد فروق ذات دلالة إحصائية في أنماط التعلم الأخرى بين الطلاب المتفوقين والعاديين. This study aimed to investigate the Students Evaluation of preferred Learning Styles in the Faculty of Education and Arts at the University of Tabuk and its Relationship with student's gender, and therefore Knowledge the differences between ordinary and talented students in the preferred learning styles, the study sample consisted of (216) students from undergraduate at the Faculty of Education and Arts at the University of Tabuk, the researcher developed a scale to evaluate the preferred learning which have appropriate psychometric characteristics. Results of the study showed that the use of The visual style of learning is the first preferred Learning Styles by the viewpoints of students, while Collective learning Style came the last rank of the scale dimensions. In addition the results of this study showed the existence of significant differences in the preferred learning styles depending on the variable gender for the benefit of students female In Individual learning style and The visual style of learning, as well that there is no statistically significant differences in learning styles between outstanding students and ordinary differences.

This study investigated the learning styles of collegiate aviation students. The results of this investigation were compared to the learning styles of qualified pilots in the United States Air Force, as identified in a previous study. Using the Kolb Learning Style Inventory, the objectives were to identify the learning styles of collegiate aviation students, determine if there was a difference in learning style among the grade levels of the college students, and to note the similarities and/or differences in learning styles between the collegiate aviation students and the United States Air Force pilots. The demographic survey used in the previous study was tailored to reflect the disparity of experiences between college students and active pilots in the United States Air Force. The population for this study consisted of students enrolled in the aviation programs at Oklahoma State University-Stillwater campus, Oklahoma State University-Tulsa campus, and Southeastern Oklahoma State University on the Durant campus and at Tinker Air Force Base. Using the results of this study to identify a preferred learning style among college aviation students can provide information about the students’ cognitive mapping. This mapping can be used as a tool so that courses can be more effectively designed. Modifications to this main theme can then be made for those students who have different learning styles. An ideal learning style, due to the predictive nature of Kolb’s Learning Style Inventory, can also identify aviation students as a discrete group from other degree programs on campus.

Accommodating learning styles in adaptive educational hypermedia systems (AEHS) improves students' learning performance in web-based learning. Hence, in implementing the systems, the students' learning style identification process is important. Most of today's AEHS rely on a traditional technique of identifying students' learning styles, which is using questionnaires. However, using questionnaires for this purpose is less efficient, cumbersome and may not be that feasible. This study proposes a real-time learning style identification technique by recording students' browsing behaviors and analyzing them by using multi-layer feed forward artificial neural network (MLFF). The result suggests that there is a relationship between the frequencies of students' click on learning components with their staying time on those components. It also indicates that the proposed identification technique performs well in identifying students' learning styles.

Learning styles play an important role in determining the most effective teaching strategies by aligning instructional methods with students’ individual preferences in receiving, processing, and understanding information. However, classroom teaching is often applied uniformly, disregarding the differences in learning styles among students. This can hinder the effectiveness of the learning process. This research aims to develop a web-based expert system using the Euclidean Probability method to identify the dominant learning styles of students at SMK Negeri 3 Lhokseumawe. The system processes input data representing student characteristics and calculates the proximity to each learning style category using the Euclidean distance formula. A total of 110 student data entries were analyzed, revealing that 32 students (29.09%) had a Visual learning style, 26 students (23.64%) were Auditory, 16 students (14.55%) were Read/Write, and 36 students (32.73%) were Kinesthetic learners. The results showed that the Kinesthetic learning style was the most dominant among students. Therefore, this expert system can efficiently assist in determining students' learning styles, allowing for quick and accurate identification of their learning preferences. This supports the development of more personalized and adaptive learning strategies, which are expected to enhance student engagement and learning outcomes.

Differences in Learning Styles: A comparison of Slovenian Universities

The present study investigates gender-based differences in learning styles among IX standard students. Recognizing individual learning preferences, especially in relation to gender, is crucial for enhancing instructional effectiveness during adolescence a stage of cognitive and emotional development. Using a survey method, data were collected from 300 students across six schools using the standardized Learning Style Inventory by J.M. Reid. Statistical analysis, including descriptive statistics and the two-tailed t-test, revealed no significant difference in learning styles between boys and girls. These findings align with previous studies, indicating that while learning preferences may vary, gender alone does not significantly impact learning style. The study underscores the importance of adopting diverse, learner-centered teaching strategies that address varied learning needs, thereby promoting inclusive and effective classroom practices.

This study was undertaken to determine any significant difference in learning styles and academic performance. Specifically, it answered the following questions 1) What is the learning style of the respondents? 2) What is the level of academic performance of Grade 11 HUMSS students? 3) Is there a relationship between learning styles and academic performance of the respondents? 4) Is there a significant difference between learning styles and academic performance when respondents are grouped according to profile? 5) On the basis of findings, what instructional development plan can be designed? The researcher was able to utilized quantitative descriptive design to answer the research question of the study. Moreover, this study also utilized another type of research design, the correlational study. It is used to find out the association between two or more variables. The study revealed that the respondents of the study have moderately applied visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learning. However, the highest and lowest grade among respondents is 98 and 82.00, respectively which has a verbal description of Outstanding and Average, respectively. The mean of the academic performance of the respondents is 91.00 with a standard deviation of 2.900 and verbal description of Very Good. The results of Pearson r correlation coefficient between the learning style and the academic performance revealed that the learning styles of the respondents in terms of visual learning with r=- 0.341 has moderate positive correlation with the academic performance of the students at p-value of 0.031** with an assumed alpha level of significance of 0.05. The findings revealed that the significant difference does exist in the learning style in terms of kinesthetic learning (t=-2.102) with p values lesser than alpha = 0.05 level of significance when the data is analyzed according to the respondents gender. Moreover, the result of t-test uncorrelated in the learning style when the data is analyzed according to the ethnicity of the respondents. As disclosed in the findings, the significant difference does exist in the learning style in terms of visual learning (t=2.814) with p values lesser than alpha= 0.05 level of significance when the data is analyzed according to the respondents ethnicity. The significant difference does not exist in the learning style in terms of visual learning (t=0.897), auditory (t=1.248), and kinesthetic (t=0.665), with p values greater than alpha=0.05 level of significance. The data imply that the socio-economic status has no significant bearing on the learning style of the respondents. An instructional development plan was proposed.

On Learning Styles, Academic Performance and Innovative Teaching Practices: Empirical Evidence from Post-Graduate Students at Department of Commerce, University of Delhi

This study was intended to determine whether the effects of noise on English listening comprehension would vary among Chinese college students with different learning styles. A total of 89 participants with different learning styles measured using Kolb’s (1985) Learning Style Inventory finished English listening comprehension tests in quiet and in white noise, Chinese two-talker babble, and English two-talker babble respectively. The results showed that the participants in general had significantly poorer performance in the two babble conditions than in quiet and white noise. However, the participants with assimilative and divergent learning styles performed relatively better in Chinese babble, and exhibited stable performance across the three noisy conditions, while the participants with convergent and accommodative learning styles had more impaired performance in both Chinese babble and English babble than in white noise. Moreover, of Kolb’s four learning modes, reflective observation had a facilitative effect on listening performance in Chinese babble and English babble. These findings suggest that differences in learning style might lead to differential performance in foreign language listening comprehension in noise.

Natural Science is a learning related to everything around us. One of the subject matter in natural science is the motion system that often occurs in daily life. However, some of the students have misconceptions about the motion system. It required the critical thinking skills of the students in understanding the concept to resolve a problem in society. Critical thinking skills is one of the skills that must be possessed by students because of the demands in the 2013 curriculum. Critical thinking skills can be influenced by several factors, one of them is students’ learning style. This study aimed to analyze the critical thinking skills of junior high school on natural sciences based on the differences in learning styles. This study took sample of students in the first, second and third grade of junior high school. In this research, the researcher uses descriptive method. To analyze the data, the researcher used mix methods (qualitative and quantitative). The technique of collecting data uses observation and tests. Observation is used to find out the types of the students’ learning styles, while tests to measure student’s critical thinking skills. The results showed that there were verbal-linguistic learning style (73.0%), logic-mathematic (67.6%), kinesthetic (60.0%), visual-spatial (60.2%), music (62.0%), and interpersonal (61.1%). So, the verbal-linguistic learning style was better than critical thinking skills.

This study was conducted with its aim to measure the dominant learning styles of Fully Residential Schools’ students. The need to acquire the dominant learning styles of these students arose since they are bound to the school environment which limits learning styles according to their inclination. Hence, individual and group learning styles were developed to fulfil the needs of the students in context of their favourite learning styles. However, there were raised concerns whether learning styles would cause different impacts, based on gender if they are integrated in Mathematics. This study gave the answer through a survey conducted on a total of 61 Fully Residential Schools’ students, 31 of whom underwent the proposed intervention in the form of flipped classroom method, while the remaining 30 were in the control group. The findings of the study obtained by a descriptive analysis showed that group learning was the dominant learning style adopted by the students. In addition, the findings also showed that, there was no significant difference in learning styles based on gender. It was concluded that Fully Residential Schools’ students needed group activities in their learning and their learning styles were not focused only on one particular type. Regardless of gender, they were capable of being actively involved in group activities. So this study had the potential to be implemented in the 21st century learning which emphasizes on group activities that should integrate learning styles well in tandem with the teachers' teaching.

Learning styles in secondary vocational education: disciplinary differences