This study considers the following question: What are the effects of 4MAT, an instructional system integrating experience and perceptual preference upon achievement, attitude, and enrollment intention in advanced mathematics courses of students in secondary school geometry classes?
To investigate this question, four intact geometry classes (80 subjects) from a medium-sized high school near Chicago were assigned to one of two groups, experimental or control, and taught for one semester using either 4MAT processes or traditional methods, respectively. The 4MAT system of teaching/learning was developed by Bernice McCarthy based upon prior work by David Kolb and others. Eight hypotheses were developed reflecting the primary variables of method, achievement, attitude and enrollment as well as secondary attributes of gender, brain hemisphericity and learning style classification. Achievement was measured by a teacher-constructed departmental final examination in geometry; attitude was pretested and posttested by the Mathematics Attitude Inventory (MAI); enrollment was obtained from school records and by personal communication; cerebral hemisphericity reflected scores on Paul Torrance's Style of Learning and Thinking (SOLAT), Youth Form; and learning styles were categorized according to the Learning Style Inventory (LSI) developed by David Kolb. The quasi-experimental factorial research format primarily incorporated ANOVA with two-way classification. Post hoc comparison testing utilized the Scheffe method.No interactions were noted, but significant main effects indicated that: (1) the experimental group substantially outperformed the control subjects on the second-semester final examination in geometry; (2) there was differential achievement with respect to learning style classification; (3) posttest attitude factor scores were, to some extent, dependent upon treatment group, gender, SOLAT and LSI; and (4) active-processors differed by treatment group in terms of their enrollment patterns.