How innovativeness and handedness affect learning performance of engineering students?

Innovativeness is already highlighted in many engineering subjects, and some recent studies aimed at investigating whether handedness differences are reflected in the learning-style and the creativity of individuals. This paper presents a study administered among a sample of 508 university students (59 out of 508 are left-handers and 389 out of 508 are engineering students). The results show that left-handed students have a higher level of innovativeness, while non-engineering students have higher levels of self-efficacy and motivation. Innovativeness has an indirect positive effect on motivation among engineering students, which implies that innovativeness training for engineering students is critical for enhancing their learning motivation, and among these, left-handers may need different facilitative approaches that inspire their self-efficacy and motivation to actualize their innovativeness potential. This study thus brings this issue to light in order that the educators and course designers should pay due attention. The learning setting can be developed with better accommodation for these ‘specific’ groups to achieve the expected learning outcomes.