Aim: To assess the learning style preferences of undergraduate dental students in Davangere city and to investigate whether learning style preferences is associated with past academic performance.
Methodology:A descriptive cross- sectional survey was conducted. Totally, 377 undergraduate dental students participated in the study. Learning style was assessed using a VARK questionnaire containing sixteen items with four answer selections corresponding to the four sensory modalities (Visual, Aural, Read/write , Kinaesthic) and past academic performance was collected from the college authorities. Descriptive statistics was applied and Chi-square test was used to assess the association between learning style preferences and past academic performance.
Results : Majority of undergraduate dental students were polymodal (73%) with bimodal type being predominantly prevalent (35.5%),followed by trimodal (20.4%) and quadmodal (17.2%).27% of students were unimodal with kinaesthetic type being predominant(13.3% ) followed by aural (7.7%),verbal (3.4%) and read and write (2.4% ). There was no significant association between learning style preference and past academic performance of the students (p = 0.9).
Conclusion: Multimodal learning preference was predominant among the undergraduate dental students of Davangere city.