title: The relationship between learning style preferences and gender, educational major and status in first year medical students: a survey study from iran.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Identifying and employing appropriate learning styles could play an important role in selecting teaching styles in order to improve education.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  This study aimed to determine the relationship between learning styles preferences and gender, educational major and status in first year students at Isfahan University of Medical Sciences.
  
  
  METHODS
  A cross-sectional study employing the visual-aural-read/write-kinesthetic (VARK) learning style's questionnaire was done on 184 first year students of medicine, pharmacy, dentistry, nursing and health services management at Isfahan University of Medical Sciences in 2012. The validity of the questionnaire was assessed through experts' views and reliability was calculated using Cronbach's alpha coefficients (α = 0.86). Data were analyzed using the SPSS ver.18 software and x(2) test.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Out of 184 participants who responded to and returned the questionnaire, 122 (66.3%) were female; more than two-thirds (68.5%) of the enrolled students were at the professional doctorate level (medicine, pharmacy, dentistry) and 31.5% at the undergraduate level (nursing and health services management). Eighty-nine (48.4%) students preferred a single-modal learning style. In contrast, the remaining 95 students (51.6%) preferred multi-modal learning styles. A significant relationship between gender and single modal learning styles (P = 0.009) and between status and learning styles (P = 0.04) was observed.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  According to the results, male students preferred to use the kinesthetic learning style more than females, while, female students preferred the aural learning style. Knowledge about the learning styles of students at educational institutes is valuable and helps solve learning problems among students, and allows students to become better learners.
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Health Services Management, Institute for Futures Studies in Health, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, IR Iran.
authors.forename: Ali
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sarabi-Asiabar
authors.affiliation: Health Management and Economics Research Center, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, IR Iran ; Department of Health Services Management, School of Health management and Information Sciences, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, IR Iran.
authors.forename: Mehdi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Jafari
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Education, School of Public Health, Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Ilam, IR Iran.
authors.forename: Jamil
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Sadeghifar
authors.affiliation: Health Management Research Centre, Baqiyatallah University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, IR Iran.
authors.forename: Shahram
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tofighi
authors.affiliation: Department of Health Services Management, Health School, Baqiyatallah University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, IR Iran.
authors.forename: Rouhollah
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Zaboli
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Prevention of Psychosocial Injuries & Student Research Committee, Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Ilam, IR Iran.
authors.forename: Hadi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Peyman
authors.affiliation: Health Management and Economics Department, School of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, IR Iran.
authors.forename: Mohammad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Salimi
authors.affiliation: Health Management and Economics Department, School of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, IR Iran.
authors.forename: Lida
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Shams
keywords: Learning Style; Medical Students; Survey; VARK