Influence of Individual Learning Styles in Online Interaction: a Case for Dynamic Frequently Asked Questions (DFAQ)

Although current literature on learning styles shows that matching a teacher’s instructional style with the learning styles of students affects performance in a classroom environment, little is known about the influence of learning styles in online interaction. The paper argues that students’ individual learning styles influences how students interact online and that rather than adapt to user’s learning styles, online environments tend to force behavior change on users’ learning styles. The paper discusses a project in which students with varying learning styles used an online consultation (DFAQ) tool for collaborative knowledge sharing, and reports on how learning styles influenced online interaction and the use of DFAQ changed rather than adapted to users’ learning styles. The paper concludes that for online environments to be educationally efficacious, sensitivity to different learning styles is desirable though the implementation of such sensitivity is non-trivial.