Intellectual styles, learning agility, and personality among university students

Abstract

The present research serves three purposes. First, the primary aim is to investigate the identity of intellectual styles, which comes to the relationships between intellectual styles and learning agility, as well as intellectual styles and personality traits. Second, it examines the reliability and validity of learning agility among university students. Third, it explores the effects of students’ background factors on the intellectual styles, learning agility, and personality.

Three hundred and forty-three students from three universities in Guangdong, Shanghai, and Shanxi from Mainland China, responded to the Thinking Styles Inventory RevisedⅡ,the Learning Agility Inventory, and the NEO Five-Factor Inventory. Results indicated that significant relationships were obtained among intellectual styles, learning agility, and personality. First, TypeⅠintellectual styles, which are more adaptive and creative, significantly and positively predicted higher scores in learning agility. Second, openness and extraversion were positively related to the more creativity-generating and more complex thinking styles. The more norm-favoring and simplistic thinking styles were positively related to neuroticism. Moreover, conscientiousness was related to all types of the thinking styles. Third, openness, conscientiousness, and extraversion personality traits predicted better outcome in learning agility while agreeableness was negatively related to learning agility. Findings also suggested that the Learning Agility Inventory was valid and reliable among university participants, which means that it is applicable to academic settings. Finally, travel experiences were significant associated with TypeⅠintellectual styles as well as higher scores in learning agility. Implications of these findings were discussed for students, teachers, and researchers.