Objetivo. Determinar si los estilos de aprendizaje (EA) de los estudiantes de medicina se correlacionan con el
contexto geográfico, con el contexto curricular o con el nivel de la carrera. Sujetos y métodos. El estudio se realizó en 490 estudiantes de las Escuelas de Medicina de las Universidades de Chile (Santiago, Chile), Nacional de
Cuyo (Mendoza, Argentina), San Francisco Xavier (Sucre, Bolivia), Zaragoza y País Vasco (España). Se aplicó el cuestionario Honey-Alonso, que valora la preferencia por cada uno de cuatro EA: activo, reflexivo, teórico y pragmático. También se evaluó el EA de acuerdo al modelo de Kolb.
Resultados. Al relacionar el EA con el contexto geográfico se observó que mientras los estudiantes de universidades
españolas muestran un estilo preferentemente asimilador, siguiendo la denominación de Kolb, para Chile fue el
acomodador y para Bolivia los estudiantes se distribuyen entre los estilos asimilador y divergente. Al comparar la
distribución de los EA durante el tercer curso de medicina en dos facultades que poseen diferente currículo, no se
observaron diferencias significativas. Los EA en una Facultad de Medicina con un currículo basado en asignaturas
(Chile) no mostraron diferencias en los tres cursos del estudio (1.º, 3.º y 5.º), siendo preferentes los estilos reflexivo
y teórico. Conclusiones. El estudio permitió establecer diferencias significativas entre los estilos de aprendizaje de
los estudiantes de Medicina en relación con el contexto geográfico, más que con los diferentes currículos, o a lo largo de los distintos cursos de la carrera.
Palabras clave. CHAEA. Contexto curricular. Contexto geográfico. Estilos de aprendizaje. Estudiantes de medicina. Kolb.
Medical students learning styles in Latin American and Spanish universities: relation with geographical and curricular contexts
Aim. To establish a correlation between medical student learning styles (LS) and the geographical context, the curricular
context and different academic levels. Subjects and methods. The study was performed in 490 undergraduate students from Medical Schools of the Universities of Chile (Santiago, Chile), Nacional de Cuyo (Mendoza, Argentina), San Francisco Xavier (Sucre, Bolivia), Zaragoza and País Vasco (Spain). The instrument used was the Honey-Alonso learning style questionnaire that assesses the student preference for one of four LS: active, reflexive, theoretic and pragmatic. In addition, LS according to the Kolb inventory were also assessed. Results. Using the Kolb inventory, significant differences were found when the LS were correlated with the geographical context. While Spanish students showed a high preference for the assimilator style of learning, Chilean students resulted to be mainly accommodators, and Bolivian students were both assimilators and divergent. Comparing the LS distribution during the third course in two universities with different curricula (problem and lecture based learning), there were no significant differences. LS of medical students from a Medical School with a lecture based curriculum (University of Chile) were not significantly different
during the first, the third and the fifth level of their undergraduate students. They showed a significant preference for reflexive and theoretic styles of learning. Conclusions. The present study allowed demonstrating that significant differences among the styles of learning of medical students correlated with the geographical context more than with the different curricula, or along the different courses of the career.
Key words. CHAEA. Curricular context. Geographical context. Kolb. Learning styles. Undergraduate medical students.
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