People learn better in their preferred learning style

People learn better in their preferred learning style
	UNSUPPORTED
	"Each person has a learning style, such as visual, auditory or kinesthetic, and they learn more effectively when teaching is matched to that style."
Domain	Education & Learning
Tactic	Pseudoscience / Junk Science;
Era	Historical
First seen	1970s
Origin	Learning style models developed from the 1970s onward, including the VAK and VARK frameworks, widely adopted in teacher training, corporate learning and popular psychology
Last reviewed	2026-10-27
	Further reading: books on Education & Learning

The claim that people learn better in their preferred learning style is one of the most widely believed ideas in education. Surveys have found that large majorities of teachers in many countries believe students learn better when lessons match their individual learning style, such as visual, auditory or kinesthetic. Learning style questionnaires are common in schools, universities and workplace training. But researchers who have reviewed the evidence have found little or no support for the central claim, known as the "meshing hypothesis": that matching instruction to a person's preferred style improves learning. People do have preferences, and good teaching often uses multiple formats, but tailoring instruction to individual styles has not been shown to help.

The claim

Learning style models classify people according to how they supposedly learn best. The most familiar is VAK, which divides learners into visual, auditory and kinesthetic (hands-on) types; the VARK model, developed by New Zealand educator Neil Fleming, adds reading and writing. Other models classify people by personality-like dimensions. Educators are encouraged to identify students' styles, often with questionnaires, and to tailor lessons accordingly, for example giving visual learners diagrams and auditory learners lectures or recordings.

Origin

Interest in individual differences in learning grew in the 1970s and 1980s, producing dozens of models. A 2004 review commissioned in the United Kingdom, led by Frank Coffield, identified 71 different learning style models. The ideas spread through teacher training, professional development and commercial products, and appealed to a belief that every student is unique and deserves personalized teaching.

What the evidence shows

In 2008 a team of cognitive psychologists, Harold Pashler, Mark McDaniel, Doug Rohrer and Robert Bjork, published a major review in Psychological Science in the Public Interest. They explained that properly testing the meshing hypothesis requires a specific experimental design: classify learners by style, randomly assign them to instruction in different styles, and test whether each group learns best when instruction matches its style. They found very few studies with such a design, and those that existed mostly did not support the hypothesis. Some contradicted it. They concluded that there was no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning style assessments into general educational practice.

Later studies reached similar conclusions. For example, a 2015 study by Beth Rogowsky and colleagues found no relationship between adults' preferred learning style and their comprehension when material was presented in matching or mismatching formats. Coffield's 2004 review also found that most learning style instruments had weak reliability and validity.

In 2017 a group of neuroscientists and psychologists published a letter in The Guardian warning that learning styles are a "neuromyth" that wastes resources and may lead teachers to pigeonhole students. Surveys have found that belief in learning styles remains widespread among teachers; a 2012 study in the UK and the Netherlands found that more than 90 percent of teachers surveyed believed in them.

What does help

Research supports other principles: matching the format to the content (maps for geography, audio for music), combining words with relevant visuals, spacing practice over time, testing recall through retrieval practice, and building on prior knowledge. These benefit learners in general, regardless of supposed style.

Why it persists

Intuition. People do have preferences and feel they learn better in certain ways, and it seems logical that matching would help.
Respect for individuality. The idea fits a commitment to treating learners as individuals.
Training and products. Learning styles have been embedded in teacher education, corporate training and commercial assessments.
Harmless-seeming. Varying teaching formats is often good practice, so the theory seems to produce good results even if its rationale is wrong.

Lessons for readers

A preference is not the same as a proven benefit.
Ask whether an educational claim has been tested with randomized experiments.
Be cautious of labels that may limit learners, such as "I'm not a visual learner."
Focus on evidence-based learning strategies such as retrieval practice and spacing.
Popularity among professionals does not make an idea true.

Sources

Harold Pashler, Mark McDaniel, Doug Rohrer and Robert Bjork, "Learning Styles: Concepts and Evidence," Psychological Science in the Public Interest 9, no. 3 (2008).
Frank Coffield et al., Learning styles and pedagogy in post-16 learning: A systematic and critical review (Learning and Skills Research Centre, 2004).
Beth A. Rogowsky, Barbara M. Calhoun and Paula Tallal, "Matching learning style to instructional method: Effects on comprehension," Journal of Educational Psychology 107, no. 1 (2015).
Sanne Dekker et al., "Neuromyths in education: Prevalence and predictors of misconceptions among teachers," Frontiers in Psychology 3 (2012).