Does gender influence learning style preferences of first-year medical students?

Department of Physiology, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, Michigan Address for reprint requests and other correspondence: S. E. DiCarlo, Dept. of Physiology, Wayne State Univ. School of Medicine, Detroit, MI 48201 (E-mail: sdicarlo{at}med.wayne.edu ) Students have specific learning style preferences, and these preferences may be different between male and female students. Understanding a student's learning style preference is an important consideration when designing classroom instruction. Therefore, we administered the visual, auditory, reading/writing, kinesthetic (VARK) learning preferences questionnaire to our first-year medical students; 38.8% (97 of 250 students) of the students returned the completed questionnaire. Both male (56.1%) and female (56.7%) students preferred multiple modes of information presentation, and the numbers and types of modality combinations were not significantly different between genders. Although not significantly different, the female student population tended to be more diverse than the male population, encompassing a broader range of sensory modality combinations within their preference profiles. Instructors need to be cognizant of these differences and broaden their range of presentation styles accordingly. Key words: visual; auditory; reading/writing; kinesthetic; styles of learning; medical education