The relationship between teaching styles and student ratings of teaching was examined at a Chinese university. 388 teachers (170 men, 218 women) were invited to fill out the 49-item Teaching Styles Inventory (Grigorenko & Sternberg, 1993). The inventory measures seven teaching styles: legislative, judicial, liberal, global, executive, conservative, and local. Scores from students' evaluations of teaching of courses for one semester were collected. Students' evaluation scores were significantly and negatively related to executive and conservative teaching styles of their teachers, while no significant correlation was found between student ratings and any of the other five teaching styles. Only conservative teaching style contributed significantly to the prediction of student ratings. Sex and age were found to have moderating effects on the relationship between teaching style and student ratings. The role of teaching styles in student ratings was discussed.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
BetoretF. D. (2007) The influence of students' and teachers' thinking styles on student course satisfaction and on their learning process. Educational Psychology, 27, 219–234.
2.
CentraJ. A. (1993) Reflective faculty evaluation: enhancing teaching and determining faculty effectiveness.San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
3.
ChenG-H. (2005) The reliability and validity analysis of student evaluation of teaching at universities in mainland China. Journal of Higher Education Research, 28, 54–56. [in Chinese]
4.
ChenG-H., & WatkinsD. (in press) The stability and correlates of student evaluations of teaching at a Chinese university. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education.
5.
D'ApolloniaS., & AbramiP. C. (1997) Navigating student ratings of instruction. American Psychologist, 52, 1198–1208.
6.
DuespohlT. A. (1989) The relationship between student ratings of teachers and the field dependent/independent cognitive styles of both teachers and students. Dissertation Abstracts International, 50, 1541–1542.
7.
GrigorenkoE. L., & SternbergR. J. (1993) Thinking Styles in Teaching Inventory. Unpublished manuscript, Yale Univer., New Haven, CT.
8.
GrigorenkoE. L., & SternbergR. J. (1995) Thinking styles. In SakloskeD. H. & ZeidnerM. (Eds.), International handbook of personality and intelligence.New York: Plenum. Pp. 205–229.
9.
HudakM. A., & AndersonD. E. (1984) Teaching style and student ratings. Teaching of Psychology, 11, 177–178.
10.
MarshH. W. (1987) Students' evaluations of university teaching: research findings, methodological issues, and directions for future research. International Journal of Educational Research, 11, 253–388.
11.
MarshH. W., & DunkinM. J. (1992) Students' evaluations of university teaching: a multidimentional perspective. In SmartJ. C. (Ed.), Higher education: handbook of theory and research.Vol. 8. New York: Agathon. Pp. 143–233.
12.
MarshH. W., & OverallJ. U. (1981) The relative influence of course level, course type, and instructor on students' evaluations of college teaching. American Educational Research Journal, 18, 103–112.
13.
MarshH. W., & RocheL. A. (1997) Making students' evaluations of teaching effectiveness effective. American Psychologist, 52, 1187–1197.
14.
PetersonK. D. (2000) Teacher evaluation: a comprehensive guide to new directions and practices. (2nd ed.) Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.
15.
PounderJ. S. (2007) Is student evaluation of teaching worthwhile? An analytical framework for answering the question. Quality Assurance in Education, 15, 178–191.
16.
SelfC. C. (1985) A study of the relationship between cognitive styles and grades received on student ratings of community college faculty. Dissertation Abstracts International, 46, 595.
17.
SternbergR. J. (1988) Mental self-government: a theory of intellectual styles and their development. Human Development, 31, 197–224.
18.
SternbergR. J. (1997) Thinking styles.New York: Cambridge Univer. Press.
19.
WachtelH. K. (1998) Student evaluation of college teaching effectiveness: a brief review. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 23, 191–211.
20.
ZhangL-F. (2001) Approaches and thinking styles in teaching. The Journal of Psychology, 135, 547–561.
21.
ZhangL-F. (2003) Are parents' and children's thinking styles related?Psychological Reports, 93, 617–630.
22.
ZhangL-F. (2004a) Field-dependence/independence: cognitive style or perceptual ability? Validating against thinking styles and academic achievement. Personality and Individual Differences, 37, 1295–1311.
23.
ZhangL-F. (2004b) Revising the predictive power of thinking styles for academic performance. The Journal of Psychology, 138, 351–370.
24.
ZhangL-F. (2004c) Thinking styles: university students' preferred teaching styles and their conceptions of effective teachers. The Journal of Psychology, 138, 233–252.
25.
ZhangL-F., & SachsJ. (1997) Assessing thinking styles in the theory of mental self-government: a Hong Kong validity study. Psychological Reports, 81, 915–928.
26.
ZhangL-F., & SternbergR. J. (1998) Thinking styles, abilities, and academic achievement among Hong Kong university students. Educational Research Journal, 13, 41–62.
27.
ZhangL-F., & SternbergR. J. (2002) Thinking styles and teachers' characteristics. International Journal of Psychology, 37, 3–12.
28.
ZhangL-F., & SternbergR. J. (2006) The nature of intellectual styles.Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
29.
ZhangL-F., & SternbergR. J. (2009) Revisiting the value issue in intellectual styles. In ZhangL-F. & SternbergR. J. (Eds.), Perspectives on the nature of intellectual styles.New York: Springer. Pp. 63–85.
