Willingham's Learning Theory (AQA GCSE Psychology)

Willingham’s theory: his criticism of learning styles

• Learning styles describe the different ways in which people learn best, according to their individual needs/skills/attributes

• As there is no firm evidence base for learning styles, Willingham (a professor in psychology from the USA) proposes that only tried and tested research should be used to inform teaching and learning

• Willingham’s learning theory is as follows:

  • Meaning and context are much more important than trying to determine what a child’s learning style is e.g. getting to grips with multiplication cannot come after a learning style has been determined as the child has to understand the mechanics of what’s involved i.e. knowledge must come first

  • Transferring short-term memory into long-term memory is an essential component of learning via rehearsal and cues e.g. a teacher using weekly tests to ensure that students use retrieval strategies to access necessary information

  • Practice must be consistent and regular to turn skills which require effort and concentration into automatic processes e.g. playing the piano or skating; practice is not dependent on learning styles

  • Children who can delay gratification have better outcomes than those who cannot: this is known as self-regulation and is a predictor of future academic (and life) success rather than learning styles

  • Neuropsychology can be used to guide and determine learning (see Willingham’s research described below) rather than learning styles

Research which supports Willingham’s learning theory

• Baddeley & Godden (1975) found that deep-sea divers who learnt information underwater recalled it best when underwater i.e. context gives meaning and cues to enable retrieval

• Rosenshine, Meister & Chapman (1996) - the best strategies for learning via reading is to consider what is already known and how it relates to the text (knowledge comes first) and then regularly assess one’s understanding of the text (self-explanation)

• Mischel (1970) - the ‘marshmallow test’:

  • A child is seated at a table which holds one marshmallow on a plate

  • The researcher says that they have to leave the room for 15 minutes

  • The child is told that if they wait 15 minutes they can have two marshmallows when the researcher gets back

  • The researcher leaves the child alone in the room (being observed via a two-way mirror)

  • 67% of the children ate the marshmallow before the 15 minutes were up

  • 10 years later the children who had waited 15 minutes (and delayed gratification) were more academically successful than the children who had given in to temptation

• Willingham (1998) - learning grows directly out of motor control processes in brain areas such as the prefrontal cortex and the cerebellum:

  • fMRI scans showed that mental practice can produce an interaction of conscious and unconscious processes in motor skill learning

  • In short, the brain is hardwired to encourage learning and to turn it into automatic responses which require little energy so that new information can be learnt

Evaluation of Willingham’s learning theory

Strengths

• There is good research support (as outlined above) for Willingham’s theory which means it is high in validity

• Neuroscientific methods (see Willingham’s use of fMRI in his study) is an objective method which should ensure reliable data

Weaknesses

• Research which is lab-based and scientific misses the human element and is low in ecological validity

• Self-regulation as a predictor of future behaviour seems like a vague variable: there are many reasons for an individual’s academic success which makes this aspect of the theory rather limited