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Openness | |
| Openness is the willingness to accept new ideas and new
ways of doing things. Openness is one of the five major factors of personality measured by
the NEO Personality Inventory. Four additional constructs discussed in the personality literature seem related to openness: Dogmatism. A person with a closed belief system is dogmatic, while a person with an open belief system is more open to learning. Tolerance for unrealistic experiences. This refers to how much an individual will accept experiences that do not agree with what that person already knows to be "true." The tolerant learner has more flexible thinking and is more likely to accept a new view of reality. Ambiguity tolerance. This is a person's willingness to adapt to encounters with ambiguous situations or ideas. A person who is intolerant perceives an ambiguous situation as a source of threat. They will avoid learning situations with unknown goals, unstated criteria, or unclear procedures. Distance education students who succeed tend to have ambiguity tolerant personalities. Risk-taking/Cautiousness. Creativity seems to be related to risk taking. The greater the departure from the standard, the greater the risk. Moderate risk taking tends to increase learning. However, academic risk taking is often not encouraged. Not surprisingly, students who are drawn toward non-traditional methods of learning such as digital distance education tend to be more open in their beliefs. Instructors who have high openness will also tend to be comfortable in this environment. |