Identifying Cultural Learning Preferences: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Korean and Chinese Students

This study aims to examine, identify, and compare the learning preferences between students in China and South Korea. Previous published studies (e.g., Wang et al., 2016; Liu et al., 2017) have laid the groundwork for this study by providing the theoretical lens for which we could conduct the current research. The Framework for Culturally Adaptive Teaching and Learning (FCATL) (Snow & Wang, 2017), building on related studies, uses three dimensions to gather data on learning preferences: Social Relationships, Epistemological Beliefs, and Temporal Perceptions. In this study, we tested the model with 126 undergraduate students from Korea and 61 undergraduate students from China using a survey instrument that is associated with the FCATL. The survey instrument derived from it was then administered to see if it can help instructors and students to reflect on their cultural preferences and learning habits. The results of our survey indicated its potential use in aligning expectations between learners and teachers, and between learners themselves.