were given instructional discourse that matched their individual learning style. Results

were mixed with only nine of eighteen studies supporting the contention that students

learn best when taught in their preferred learning style. In another example, Wingenbach

(2000) used the Group Embedded Figures Test (GEFT) (Witkin, Oltman, Raskin & Karp,

1971) and found undergraduates with field-independent learning styles had a moderately

positive and significant relationship with student academic achievement. However,

DeTure (2004) used the GEFT and found no evidence to significantly predict student

academic achievement from learning style. Why do these findings conflict? If Kirton

(2003) is correct, all students are capable of achieving academic success within their own

cognitive style. If academic achievement is dependent on the expectations of the faculty

member, could dissimilar cognitive style between students and the faculty member be an

intervening variable?

 Kirton's Adaption-Innovation (A-I) Theory (2003) identifies cognitive style as a

preference to the amount of structure that one undertakes when solving problems. Within

the continuum of learning style families (Coffield et al., 2004), Kirton's work resides in

the fourth family noted above, "flexibly stable learning preferences" (p.9). Some people

are more adaptive when solving problems, and other people are more innovative when

solving problems. Adaptiveness and innovativeness anchor on continuums of how people

approach problems, produce ideas, and adhere to structures. These three constructs

measure a fixed perception of an environment in which the individual interacts with and

responds in the process of learning while solving a problem; a fit to this study's definition

of learning style (Claxton and Ralston, 1978). More detail will be given to Kirton's

cognitive style's relationship to learning in chapter 2.