Learning Styles of Australian Aviation Students: An Assessment of the Impact of Culture

Australia has a rich history in aviation and has the tradition of being a pilot training provider for many decades. Students from all over the world are being attracted to Australia every year with the ambition of becoming a commercial pilot. An understanding of the impact of national cultures on the learning styles of student pilots from different culture backgrounds will be beneficial to the overall quality of pilot education in Australia. In this study, students enrolled in the aviation (pilot) program of Swinburne University of Technology were surveyed using Kolb’s Learning Style Inventory, and subsequent analysis was performed to the survey data. It was found that a predominant percentage of aviation students were adopting converging and assimilating styles. When comparing findings of this project with previous studies using samples from China and the United States, Australian students’ preference of abstract conceptualization was found to be quite similar to that of American students and different from Chinese students, which is an indication of the impact of national culture on learning style preference. This newfound knowledge of Australian aviation students will help raise the understanding how aviation students of different cultural backgrounds learn piloting skills and provide insightful information for flight training academies and researchers.