University lecturers' use of active teaching methods: a segmentation study concerning trust, empowerment, thinking styles and emotional intelligence

Abstract

Purpose
The purpose of this study is to examine the adoption of the active learning and teaching methods by university lecturers, taking into account the contribution of certain important factors, including trust, empowerment, thinking styles and emotional intelligence. In addition, this study further reveals the diverse nature of university lecturers with regards to their tendencies to adopt active teaching methods using the segmentation technique of marketing.

Design/methodology/approach
A structured survey was implemented with university lecturers in Hanoi (Vietnam), obtaining a sample of 218 respondents from six universities. Descriptive analysis was carried out to identify the extent of the adoption of these methods. In addition, cluster analysis and analysis of variance were computed to extract and define the segments of university lecturers.

Findings
The findings show that the lecturers, on average, had a tendency to apply active teaching methods. However, the extent of the application of these methods differed among four clusters: “conservatives,” “liberals,” “junior conservatives” and “junior liberals.” In addition, it was found that the degree to which active methods were applied may have been affected by the lecturers' trust in and their empowerment of the students. The application of active methods may also have been influenced by various covert characteristics of the lecturers, including thinking styles (cognition-based) and emotional intelligence (affect-based). The lecturers' overt characteristics, such as age, education and experience, may also have affected their application of active methods, while biological sex seems not to have been a significant factor.

Originality/value
The results of this study expand the literature by explaining the diversity of university lecturers from the perspective of the active teaching and learning methods. They also provide implications for the management of education reform based on the varied implementation of the said methods that has already taken place.

Full text

University lecturers’use of active
teaching methods: a segmentation
study concerning trust,
empowerment, thinking styles
and emotional intelligence
B

ınh Nghi^
em-Ph
u
School of Economics and Management,
University of Hyogo–Kobe Commerce Campus, Kobe, Japan, and
Th
anh Hưng Nguyễn
Faculty of Accounting and Auditing, Thuongmai University, Hanoi, Vietnam
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this study is to examine the adoption of the active learning and teaching methods by
university lecturers, taking into account the contribution of certain important factors, including trust,
empowerment, thinking styles and emotional intelligence. In addition, this study further reveals the diverse
nature of university lecturers with regards to their tendencies to adopt active teaching methods using the
segmentation technique of marketing.
Design/methodology/approach –A structured survey was implemented with university lecturers in Hanoi
(Vietnam), obtaining a sample of 218 respondents from six universities. Descriptive analysis was carried out to
identify the extent of the adoption of these methods. In addition, cluster analysis and analysis of variance were
computed to extract and define the segments of university lecturers.
Findings –The findings show that the lecturers, on average, had a tendency to apply active teaching methods.
However, the extent of the application of these methods differed among four clusters: “conservatives,”
“liberals,”“junior conservatives”and “junior liberals.”In addition, it was found that the degree to which active
methods were applied may have been affected by the lecturers’trust in and their empowerment of the students.
The application of active methods may also have been influenced by various covert characteristics of the
lecturers, including thinking styles (cognition-based) and emotional intelligence (affect-based). The lecturers’
overt characteristics, such as age, education and experience, may also have affected their application of active
methods, while biological sex seems not to have been a significant factor.
Originality/value –The results of this study expand the literature by explaining the diversity of university
lecturers from the perspective of the active teaching and learning methods. They also provide implications for
the management of education reform based on the varied implementation of the said methods that has already
taken place.
Keywords Vietnam’s university, Lecturer segmentation, Active methods, Cognition-based criteria, Affect-
based criteria
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Societies are continually changing, and as a consequence, education is regularly undergoing
reform (Cheng, 2020;Elliott and Paton, 2018;Triola et al., 2018). Nowadays, students or
learners are considered the center of the educational processes. The role of the lecturers has
Active
teaching
methods
©B

ınh Nghi^
em-Ph
u and Th
anh Hưng Nguyễn. Published in Journal of Asian Business and Economic
Studies. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative
Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create
derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full
attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://
creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
https://www.emerald.com/insight/2515-964X.htm
Received 30 May 2020
Revised 4 September 2020
18 December 2020
30 January 2021
Accepted 4 March 2021
Journal of Asian Business and
Economic Studies
Emerald Publishing Limited
2515-964X
DOI 10.1108/JABES-05-2020-0057

been transformed from teaching to instructing and facilitating the students’learning. Thus,
various methods have been proposed and adopted to actively involve and engage students in
the learning activities (Hwang et al., 2015;Prince and Felder, 2007;Yew and Goh, 2016).
Regarding this topic, the majority of the research to date has centered on the practices,
processes and effects of student-centered learning and teaching methods (Lazonder and
Harmsen, 2016;McEnroe-Petitte and Farris, 2020;Yew and Goh, 2016). A smaller amount
of research has focused on the motivators, facilitators and constraints of the implementation
of such methods (Carless, 2003;Lam et al., 2010). Little research, however, has looked at two of
the most important conditions of active teaching methods: trust and empowerment (Curzon-
Hobson, 2002;Tan, 2004). Without these two elements, lecturers may not give their students
chances to coexplore, coproduce and coevaluate knowledge or choose to apply active
teaching methods. As a result, education reform through the employment of the active
learning and teaching methods may not be able to achieve its goals.
The selection and adoption of active teaching methods, nevertheless, are affected by many
external factors, for example, the characteristics of a nation’s culture, support from the school
and colleagues and the cooperation of the students and their families (Carless, 2003;Lam et al.,
2010;Pham and Renshaw, 2013). In addition, the processes may also be influenced by many
internal forces, for example, each lecturer’s thinking style (cognition) and emotional
intelligence (affect) (Pennington, 1996). Unfortunately, the existing literature has neglected
the contribution of such internal elements on the lecturers’selection and adoption processes
and decisions. Without this important knowledge, education reform through changes in the
teaching and learning methods may be weakened (van Veena et al., 2005).
Moreover, lecturers have always been treated as a homogeneous group with regards to
education reform initiatives. However, this population is actually a diverse entity (Finnegan,
1993;May et al., 2013), although their diversity is not as extensive as that of their students
(Baumann and Hamin, 2011;Mutz and Daniel, 2013). Therefore, it is necessary to segment the
lecturer population in order to choose the most appropriate approach to facilitate and
maintain enthusiasm for changes in each lecturer cluster.
The purpose of this study, therefore, is to examine the adoption of the active learning and
teaching methods by university lecturers, taking into account the contribution of certain
important factors, including trust, empowerment, thinking styles and emotional intelligence.
Based on the initial observations of this undertaking, the study further reveals the diverse
nature of university lecturers with regards to their tendencies to adopt active teaching
methods using the segmentation technique of marketing. The results of this study will
expand the literature by explaining the diversity of university lecturers from the perspective
of active teaching and learning methods. They will also provide implications for the
management of education reform based on the varied implementation of the said methods
that has already taken place.
Literature review
The active teaching methods and their antecedents
Active teaching methods are those that put students at the center of the teaching and learning
processes and encourage them to actively participate in the education activities (Prince and
Felder, 2007). Such methods have been strongly advocated in recent decades since they can
help students develop their reflective, critical and collaborative skills as well as help increase
their motivation, satisfaction and academic achievement (Hwang et al., 2015;McEnroe-Petitte
and Farris, 2020;Yew and Goh, 2016).
Each active teaching method has its own implementation process. For example, the
inquiry-based method involves five basic phases: orientation, conceptualization,
investigation, conclusion and discussion (Pedaste et al., 2015). Alternatively, the project-
JABES

based method requires one important starting point (problem presentation) and one essential
ending point (the final product) (Helle et al., 2006). In between lay many necessary activities,
for example, lectures, out-class group work, in-class group work and workshops and tutoring,
among others (de los R

ıos et al., 2010).
Although the practices and processes are diverse, active methods all require and facilitate
the involvement and flexibility of both the lecturers and the students (Powell, 2000). In order
to accomplish this, students must be trusted that they can do what have been traditionally
considered some of the tasks of their lecturers, for example, content planning and delivery
and performance evaluation (Niemi, 2002). If lecturers do not trust the ability and the
readiness of their students, they will limit, or even eliminate, students’participation. In
addition, lecturers must also believe that they are capable of motivating their students and
controlling the processes and outcomes of the classes (Bandura, 1993). If not, they may be
reluctant to attempt active teaching methods.
Trust, however, only represents the perceptual yet invisible part of lecturers’attitude
toward the selection and adoption of the active methods of teaching (Jones, 1996).
Empowerment, on the other hand, is the operational and visible part of their attitude.
Empowerment means that the lecturers authorize their students to play a bigger role in all of
the education processes (Cook-Sather, 2002). In this regard, the students of active learning
classes (project-based) have a more favorable perception of their own empowerment
compared to students studying in classes taught in traditional ways (lecture-based) (Siu
et al., 2005).
In addition, the selection and adoption of suitable and preferable teaching methods are
influenced by personal factors internal to the lecturer, for example, thinking style and
emotional intelligence. Thinking style refers to the ways individuals prefer to use the abilities
and resources that they possess in order to do things (Zhang and Sternberg, 2002). For
example, “conservative”people want to work on tasks that allow them to follow existing rules
and procedures. Conversely, “liberal”people have a desire to try new and challenging things
(Zhang, 2010). Thinking styles, thus, are also closely related to the values that people of the
same culture or nation share with one another (Hofstede et al., 2010). For example, creative
people may find it harder to implement innovative and unconventional ideas in conservative
societies than in liberal societies.
Moreover, emotional intelligence is regarded as the ability to identify and manage the
feelings of oneself and others (Salovey et al., 1995). A lecturer with a higher level of emotional
intelligence may choose a more humanitarian approach when teaching, while a lecturer with a
lower level of emotional intelligence may stick with a more controlling and dictatorial method
(Vandervoort, 2006). Thus, emotional intelligence is a personal concept and differs among
members of the same culture or nation as does thinking style.
Segmentation studies in the education sector
Market segmentation procedures were introduced into academia in the mid-1950s (Dolnicar,
2002;Foedermayr and Diamantopoulos, 2008). Market segmentation is often regarded as the
division of the market into relatively heterogeneous segments of customers (Kotler and
Armstrong, 2018). Benefits of this practice are numerous. For example, by understanding the
structure of the market, managers are able to focus on the most suitable segments of
customers. In other words, the misuse or waste of resources for undesirable segments can be
avoided. However, weaknesses of this practice are also plentiful. For example, as
segmentation is an exploratory process, the division of individuals into segments may be
artificial and invalid. Based on the specific purposes and criteria, a market may be divided
into different aggregations of segments. In addition, due to its dynamic nature, the
segmentation of a market must be an ongoing process. In other words, segmentation must be
Active
teaching
methods

repeated within certain intervals of time to ensure the meaningfulness of the divisions and the
resulting outcomes.
Technically, there are two basic methods of market segmentation: common sense and data
driven (Dolnicar, 2002). Applying the first method (common sense or a priori), researchers
distinguish different segments based on predetermined criteria, for example, biological sex,
age, education, income and type of service and product, among others (Qiu et al., 2015).
Employing the second method (data driven or post hoc), researchers identify segments based
on the patterns observed within the data, for example, the latent factors and clusters (Guillet
et al., 2015). In both cases, the data are collected from respondents through structured
instruments or interviews.
Having begun as a practice in marketing, the segmentation method has been applied in a
variety of other sectors, including education (Davari et al.,2019;Lee et al.,2019). Results of
previous studies have found that student populations are diverse markets on the one hand. For
example, in a study in Peru, Angulo et al. (2010) observed six distinct segments in the student
population based on their perceived emotional and rational attributes and goals:
“the independent,”“the entrepreneur,”“the rational,”“the dreamer,”“the hard worker”and
“the emotional.”In another study in the Netherlands, Constantinides and Stagno (2011)
identified three different segments with regard to the students’use of social media: “beginners,”
“social users”and “informational users.”These findings provide important implications for
the management of both the curricular and extra-curricular activities of the students.
On the other hand, earlier studies have also discovered that lecturer populations are
heterogeneous entities. Taking into account the lecturers’perceptions of distance study
issues, four segments could be detected: “the skeptics,”“the optimists,”“the mild-promising”
and “the outliers”(Tao and Yeh, 2008). Alternatively, considering lecturers’beliefs on
teaching and technology, five segments could be distinguished: “learner-centered lecturers
with technology,”“lecturers critical of technology use in school,”“lecturers uncomfortable
with technology,”“
lecturers uneasy with learner-centered teaching”and “lecturers critical of
a clear-cut stance”(Admiraal et al., 2017). These outcomes are important to the management
of the teaching staff in order to achieve its educational goals, including implementing
education reform initiatives. It should be noted that the contexts of the just mentioned studies
are Taiwan and the Netherlands, respectively.
Method
Selection of setting and population
Vietnam is the setting of this study. It is a worthy location for investigation for two reasons.
First, the country has been working hard to reform its education institutions (Nguyen et al.,
2016;Nguyen and Bui, 2016). The task is even more challenging in recent years since more and
more Vietnamese students are inclined to choose to study overseas. The implementation of
active teaching and learning methods can help make the education system in Vietnam more
appealing and competitive vis-a-vis other innovative foreign institutions (Nghi^
em-Ph
uand
Nguyễn, 2020). Second, making educational reforms in Vietnam is difficult because the country
is constrained by its own traditions and cultural values (Nguyen and Tran, 2018;Truong et al.,
2017). The values and benefits (e.g. autonomy and individuality) that active teaching methods
advocate and facilitate seem to be in conflict with Vietnam’s traditional thoughts and practices,
which focus on communality and dependency (Hofstede et al.,2010). Examination of
this dilemma will not only provide timely insights for education reform in Vietnam but
also references for other Asian countries in similar situations (Pham and Renshaw, 2013).
In this study, specifically university lecturers are studied. The lecturers are generally
defined as the teaching staff or faculty members who are currently teaching at universities in
Vietnam. The rank of the lecturers, however, is not taken into account.
JABES

Instrument development
This study relied on existing literature to develop its questionnaire. The items used to
measure the active teaching method practices were found in Niemi (2002). The selected items
describe the active teaching and learning process, which starts from planning and finishes at
evaluation (Helle et al., 2006;Pedaste et al., 2015). In addition, the measures of trust were
developed based on the list of skills needed by students as proposed by Boyatzis and Kolb
(1995). Each statement expresses the belief that a lecturer holds about the students’ability to
perform a given task in the learning process. Moreover, the empowerment scale was created
based on the attributes collected by Rogers et al. (1997). The selected items show the ways
that lecturers give their students the right and decision-making power to perform their
learning tasks.
In addition to these segmentation criteria, the questionnaire also includes two groups of
differentiation indicators. First, the overt or observable group is made up of information
including lecturers’age, biological sex, highest level of education and length of service in the
education sector. Second, the covert or unseen group consists of one cognition-based scale
and one affect-based scale. The thinking style scale (cognition) was revised from that of
Zhang (2004). Originally, Zhang’s (2004) scale employed 13 items, which represent 13
thinking styles. However, many of them are the opposite of each other. Therefore, these
monopolar items were combined together to create a new bipolar scale. In addition, the
emotional intelligence scale (affect) was modified from that of Wong and Law (2002). In their
study, Wong and Law (2002) structured emotional intelligence with four components: self-
emotion appraisal, others’emotion appraisal, use of emotion and regulation of emotion. While
the first two components reflect the ability to identify the emotions of oneself and others, the
last two only show the ability to regulate the emotions of oneself. As a consequence, the scale
is unable to measure the ability to regulate the emotions of others as generally defined by
Salovey et al. (1995). In order to correct the existing scale, the subject in the “use of emotion”
component was changed from oneself to others (e.g. “I always set goals for myself and then
try my best to achieve them”→“I would always encourage and support other people to
achieve their goals”).
The questionnaire was originally developed in English (Table 1). It was then translated
into Vietnamese by one researcher of the research group following a translation –back
translation process assisted by Google Translate. After that, the questionnaire was corrected
and then approved by a Vietnamese professor fluent in both Vietnamese and English. To
further ensure that the questionnaire could be understood by the prospective respondents, it
was later pretested on a small sample of ten lecturers from a university in Hanoi with which
one of the researchers is affiliated. Since no issues were observed in the pretest, the
questionnaire was used for the main survey.
Survey administration
This study applies an a priori segmentation approach (Dolnicar, 2002) with three preselected
segmentation criteria: active teaching method practices, trust and empowerment. In order to
implement a valid analysis, at least 70 responses are necessary for each segmentation
criterion (Dolnicar, 2002). With three criteria, the minimum sample size needed to guarantee a
valid outcome is 210. This threshold was employed to guide the data collection process.
In this study, the snowball sampling method was adopted (Sadler et al., 2010).
Theoretically, this method is suitable with the recruitment of respondents from a hidden
population. The respondents of this study, university lecturers in Vietnam, are not hidden.
However, a complete and identifiable population is not available. Therefore, in practice, the
snowball sampling method is appropriate.
Since both researchers have a long working and living history in Hanoi, the capital city of
Vietnam was chosen as the setting of this study. Although the selection was based on
Active
teaching
methods

convenience, the Hanoi setting is also representative because this city is one of the two largest
education centers in Vietnam, alongside Ho Chi Minh City. Next, the organization of youth
unions in higher education institutions in Hanoi was chosen as the sampling channel after
evaluating the available resources. In total, five universities (excluding the university at
which one of the researchers is currently working) were purposively approached considering
three major factors: location within Hanoi, ownership (national or private) and specialization
(technology or social sciences). The youth union leader of each university was recruited as the
first level of respondents. They then delivered to and gathered the questionnaires from other
lecturers in their corresponding universities to ensure diversity in biological sex, age, level of
Active method practices
I let students plan and carry out the contents of study units, group tasks and individual tasks A1
I let students seek for knowledge from different information sources A2
I let students evaluate their own and their peers’performances A3
Trust
I believe that each student is a potential leader in his/her field of expertise B1
I believe that students have the ability to build up relationships with other people B2
I believe that students can help and delegate one another B3
I believe that students can easily adapt to new situations B4
I believe that students have the ability to gather and analyze information B5
I believe that students can set up and implement their own goals of study B6
I believe that students can manage and use the recently developed technologies for their study B7
I believe that students can take action when necessary B8
Empowerment
I let students make decisions on their own C1
I let students choose the skills and knowledge that they define as important C2
I give students the freedom to get access to the information and resources that they need C3
I give students a range of options from which to make choices C4
I let students think and do differently C5
I encourage students to express their true feelings C6
I make students to feel that they are part of a group C7
Thinking styles
I prefer to work on tasks that require creative strategies (legislative) vs. I prefer to work on tasks with
clear instructions and structures (executive)
D1
I prefer to work on tasks that allow complete focus on one thing at a time (monarchic) vs. I prefer to work
on multiple tasks in the service of multiple objectives (oligarchic)
D2
I prefer to pay more attention to the overall picture of an issue and to abstractideas (global) vs. I prefer to
work on tasks that require working with concrete details (local)
D3
I prefer to work on tasks that allow one to work as an independent unit (internal) vs. I prefer to work on
tasks that allow for collaborative ventures with other people (external)
D4
I prefer to work on tasks that involve novelty and ambiguity (liberal) vs. I prefer to work on tasks that
allow one to adhere to the existing rules and procedures in performing tasks (conservative)
D5
Emotional intelligence
I have a good sense of why I have certain feelings most of the time E1
I have good understanding of my own emotions E2
I always know my friends’emotions from their behavior E3
I am a good observer of others’emotions E4
I am able to control my temper and handle difficulties rationally E5
I am quite capable of controlling my own emotions E6
I would always encourage and support other people to achieve their goals E7
I would always tell other people that they are competent to do certain tasks E8
Table 1.
The measures
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education attained and experience. Here, the experiential knowledge of the first-level
respondents served as the guideline (Jennings, 2001). Over a three-month period in the first
half of 2019, a total of 221 questionnaires were responded to voluntarily. The ten
questionnaires of the pretest survey were also added to the sample to increase the sample size.
After eliminating the questionnaires with missing answers for the main items, a sample of 218
was retained. This sample, although medium in size, is adequate for a segmentation with
three criteria (Dolnicar, 2002). Thus, the collection of survey data was concluded.
The sample consists of 127 females (58.2%) and 86 males (39.4%). In total, five
respondents did not indicate their sex. The majority of the sample (86.7%) includes younger
lecturers (aged under 49). Almost 65 percent of the lecturers had already obtained a graduate
degree (master’s or doctorate) while the remaining had not or are still in the process of
obtaining one. A total of 47.7 percent of the lecturers had less than ten years of experience in
teaching, while 52.3% had been teaching for more than ten years. These figures reflect the
real situation with regards to human resources in the higher education sector in Vietnam in
recent years (General Statistics Office of Vietnam, 2019). The profile of the respondents is
displayed in Table 2.
Data analysis
After being collected, the data were analyzed in IBM SPSS (International Business Machines
Corporation’s Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) through several steps. First,
descriptive analysis of the data was undertaken to reveal the levels of adoption of active
learning and teaching methods by university lecturers, as well as the related characteristics
of trust, empowerment, thinking styles and emotional intelligence.
Second, the reliability of the three segmentation-criteria scales was calculated. The
outcomes revealed that the Cronbach’s alphas of trust and empowerment are 0.81 and 0.76,
respectively, with all the corrected item total correlation values exceeding 0.40. Thus, these
two scales have reliable internal consistency levels (Morgan et al., 2004). However, among the
three measures of the practice scale, one measure (A2) has a relatively low corrected item total
correlation value (0.26). Therefore, this item was removed to improve the alpha to 0.65, which
is acceptable with a short scale with only two items (Tavakol and Dennick, 2011).
Nevertheless, this removal has left the middle part of the teaching and learning process
(students searching for information) unaccounted. The remaining two measures only capture
the beginning and the end of the process (students participating in planning and evaluation).
Third, the average values of the three criteria were calculated and used in the
segmentation process (Burns and Burns, 2008). Initially, a hierarchical analysis using Ward’s
method was undertaken to define the number of the clusters. The calculation of the change in
the agglomeration values suggested a four-cluster solution. Prior to this solution (two or three
clusters), the diversity of the sample might be overlooked. On the other hand, after this
solution (five clusters or more), the changes become smaller, and the clusters might be too
small to be meaningful (Table 3). Next, a k-mean analysis was implemented to determine the
members of each cluster. On average, each cluster’s members have a similar tendency to
adopt active teaching methods and a similar level of trust in and empowerment of the
students. Lastly, an analysis of variance (ANOVA and Kruskal–Wallis) was computed to
compare the thinking styles, emotional intelligence and other background information of the
four clusters.
Findings
The analysis shows that the lecturers in Hanoi have an average tendency to apply active
teaching methods (mean value m53.74 out of 5 points). They seem to be more generous in
Active
teaching
methods

University Ownership Specialization Number Age
a
Sex
b
Education
c
Service length
d
HaUI National Technology 56 31/14/8/3/0 0/27/29 28/15/13 29/25/2/0
EPU National Technology 45 30/6/5/3/1 0/29/16 24/11/10 25/14/2/4
HANU National Social sciences 48 10/18/11/8/1 2/30/16 9/33/6 24/18/5/1
AOF National Social sciences 34 6/18/7/3/0 0/20/14 0/20/14 13/14/6/1
TDU Private Social sciences 25 5/4/6/7/3 3/13/9 7/12/6 7/4/10/4
TMU National Social sciences 10 0/9/1/0/0 0/8/2 7/3/0 6/4/0/0
Note(s): HaUI 5Hanoi University of Industry; EPU 5Electric Power University; HANU 5Hanoi University; AOF 5Academy of Finance; TDU 5Thanh Do University;
TMU 5Thuong Mai University
a
Under 30/30–39/40–49/50–59/Over 60
b
Missing/Female/Male
c
Bachelor/Master/Doctor
d
Less than 10 years/11–20 years/21–30 years/More than 30 years
Table 2.
Profile of the
respondents
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letting students search for necessary information for their classes (m53.89) than in doing
other activities. Similarly, the lecturers’trust and empowerment are also in an average range
(m53.81 and 3.64 out of 5 points, respectively). The details are displayed in Table 4.
Based on these three criteria, four clusters of the university lecturer sample were identified
(Tables 4 and 5). The clusters are named after their levels of adoption of active teaching
methods.
The first cluster is a niche group with only seven members, all coming from the same
technology university. These lecturers are strictly conservative in terms of the teaching
methods they use to deliver the contents of their classes. Thus, this cluster was labeled
“conservatives.”Specifically, the lecturers in this cluster do not give their students
opportunities to be active learners. In addition, they hold a low level of trust in their students’
abilities and seem to limit the power that the students can have in their classes. In addition,
the conservative lecturers have internally monarchic thinking styles. However, they declare
that they have creative tendencies, which is quite intriguing if taking into account their
preferences toward the nonapplication of active teaching methods. Their level of self-rated
emotional intelligence, nevertheless, is low, on average. Interestingly, these conservative
lecturers are relatively young in age, and the majority of them do not have a doctorate degree.
The second cluster is the opposite of the first one and has the largest number of members
(n583). The high self-rated scores in all criteria suggest that the lecturers in this cluster
prefer active teaching methods, which require a lot of trust in their students’abilities and
empowerment. Therefore, this cluster was labeled “liberals.”The “liberals”have the highest
level of emotional intelligence. They tend to possess executive, local and conservative styles
of thinking. However, these lecturers also want to work on multiple tasks and with
collaborative partners. Many of the liberal lecturers are in their 30s (n528) and have a
master’s degree (n540). Approximately 36 percent of them have less than 10 (n530) or 20
(n531) years of teaching experience.
The third cluster has 73 members who are relatively conservative in terms of applying the
active teaching methods, and thus was named “junior conservatives,”although they have a
relatively high level of trust in, and give a relatively high level of power to, their students.
They also have a somewhat liberal thinking style. In this cluster, younger lecturers make up
the majority. Those with a doctorate degree are less in number than those with a lower degree.
Finally, the fourth cluster includes 55 lecturers who are quite liberal in terms of applying
active teaching methods but not as much so as the liberals, and thus were named “junior
liberals,”although their amounts of trust and empowerment are lower. The “junior liberals”
regarded themselves a little bit weaker in terms of emotional intelligence compared to the
“junior conservatives.”These lecturers have somewhat oligarchic and external approaches.
Their characteristics are also similar to the “junior conservatives”in that they both are young
and possess lower degrees than the other two groups on average.
Number of clusters
Agglomeration coefficient
of previous step
Agglomeration coefficient
of this step Change
2 342.7202 239.1599 103.5603
3 239.1599 182.8400 56.3199
4 182.8400 148.3479 34.4921
5 148.3479 122.7089 25.6390
6 122.7089 97.1715 25.5373
7 85.7581 74.5833 11.1748
8 74.5833 63.9425 10.6408
9 63.9425 54.3011 9.6414
10 54.3011 47.4236 6.8775
Table 3.
Calculation of the
agglomeration
coefficients
Active
teaching
methods

Further observation shows that the four clusters differ in almost all criteria, with the
exceptions of one emotional intelligence variable (E7) and one demographic variable
(biological sex). This suggests that the adoption of active teaching methods by the lecturers in
this survey might be affected by their level of trust in students, their tendency to empower
students and their thinking styles and emotional intelligence. In addition, the adoption might
also be influenced by the age, education and length of service of the lecturers. Specifically, the
older, more educated and more experienced lecturers tend to be more liberal in applying
active teaching methods.
Discussion
The four clusters of the university lecturers in Hanoi, Vietnam loosely fit a 2 32 matrix with
active teaching methods on one axis and empowerment and trust on the other axis. As seen in
Figure 1, liberal lecturers and conservative lecturers can be considered two opposite groups
whose application of active teaching methods, on the one hand, and empowerment and trust,
on the other hand, differ significantly from each other. “Liberals”and “junior liberals”have
Whole sample
Cluster 1
(n57)
Cluster 2
(n583)
Cluster 3
(n573)
Cluster 4
(n555)
FSigMean Mean Std Mean Std Mean Std Mean Std
A1 3.55 1.57 0.79 4.11 0.83 2.71 1.03 4.05 0.76 50.459 0.000
A2 3.89 2.29 0.49 4.34 0.74 3.33 0.87 4.15 0.78 32.844 0.000
A3 3.78 2.57 0.98 4.37 0.66 2.86 0.98 4.24 0.69 59.032 0.000
Average 3.74 2.14 0.69 4.31 0.49 2.82 0.39 4.24 0.43 197.843 0.000
B1 3.78 1.71 0.76 4.22 0.61 3.68 0.85 3.53 0.84 28.930 0.000
B2 3.87 2.43 0.53 4.24 0.67 3.86 0.67 3.49 0.96 19.924 0.000
B3 3.94 2.14 1.07 4.24 0.71 3.92 0.72 3.75 0.87 18.257 0.000
B4 3.79 3.00 0.82 4.16 0.61 3.79 0.83 3.33 0.98 14.217 0.000
B5 3.99 2.86 1.07 4.18 0.65 4.08 0.72 3.71 0.92 9.757 0.000
B6 3.66 2.43 0.98 4.00 0.72 3.68 0.72 3.27 1.03 14.281 0.000
B7 3.69 2.57 1.51 4.13 0.78 3.68 0.88 3.18 1.02 15.968 0.000
B8 3.72 2.14 1.35 4.16 0.59 3.58 0.86 3.45 0.83 20.993 0.000
Average 3.81 2.29 0.49 4.18 0.39 3.81 0.43 3.38 0.59 58.438 0.000
C1 3.31 1.14 0.38 3.80 0.71 3.19 0.94 3.00 0.96 26.903 0.000
C2 3.31 2.14 0.69 3.92 0.75 3.00 1.01 2.96 0.88 23.143 0.000
C3 3.95 2.29 0.76 4.33 0.72 3.95 0.96 3.60 0.87 17.675 0.000
C4 3.55 2.29 1.25 4.16 0.71 3.48 0.93 2.89 0.88 30.574 0.000
C5 3.80 3.00 0.82 4.24 0.67 3.52 0.85 3.60 0.91 14.678 0.000
C6 3.78 2.86 1.21 4.24 0.71 3.95 0.98 2.98 0.71 29.462 0.000
C7 3.82 3.43 1.62 4.41 0.64 3.93 0.95 2.82 0.70 43.642 0.000
Average 3.64 2.57 0.53 4.18 0.39 3.64 0.61 3.11 0.37 70.363 0.000
D1 3.58 1.71 1.25 3.78 1.32 3.37 1.31 3.78 1.03 7.147 0.000
D2 3.59 2.14 0.90 3.63 1.33 3.33 1.32 4.05 1.01 6.810 0.000
D3 3.43 3.14 0.69 3.75 1.07 3.14 1.18 3.38 0.99 4.366 0.005
D4 3.71 2.00 0.58 3.78 1.16 3.47 1.34 4.13 1.00 8.386 0.000
D5 3.28 3.00 1.63 3.61 1.25 2.99 1.25 3.18 0.82 4.057 0.008
E1 3.88 2.00 0.82 3.92 0.72 3.99 0.86 3.91 0.91 12.743 0.000
E2 3.73 2.71 0.49 3.95 0.68 3.82 0.73 3.42 0.81 10.871 0.000
E3 3.87 2.29 1.11 3.99 0.61 3.96 0.73 3.78 0.79 12.716 0.000
E4 3.71 3.14 1.07 3.95 0.66 3.68 0.88 3.45 0.88 5.470 0.001
E5 3.80 2.71 1.11 3.99 0.76 3.62 0.84 3.89 0.88 6.840 0.000
E6 3.91 3.14 1.35 4.08 0.74 4.00 0.75 3.62 0.91 6.061 0.001
E7 4.09 3.71 1.60 4.14 0.67 4.11 0.70 4.04 0.77 0.854 0.466
E8 3.99 2.57 1.27 4.10 0.69 4.19 0.72 3.75 0.87 11.985 0.000
Table 4.
Comparison of clusters
JABES

Active method adoption Cluster 1 (n57) Cluster 2 (n583) Cluster 3 (n573) Cluster 4 (n555) Chi-square Sig
Age Under 30 3.67 4 19 29 30 19.527 0.000
30–39 3.71 1 28 25 15
40–49 3.73 1 16 14 7
50–59 3.99 1 16 4 3
Over 60 4.00 0 4 1 0
Sex Missing 0 2 3 0 1.670 0.644
Male 3.71 3 33 23 27
Female 3.79 4 48 47 28
Education Bachelor 3.61 3 17 28 27 14.666 0.002
Master 3.75 3 40 30 21
Doctoral 3.90 1 26 15 7
Experience Less than 10 3.64 2 30 42 30 13.706 0.003
11–20 3.81 3 31 22 23
20–30 3.77 1 16 8 0
More than 30 3.97 1 6 1 2
Table 5.
Background
information of clusters
Active
teaching
methods

different levels of empowerment and trust, while “conservatives”and “junior conservatives”
have different intensities of application of active teaching methods. Finally, and interestingly,
both “liberals”and “junior conservatives”empower and trust their students quite a lot,
although the amounts they apply active teaching methods vary greatly. In addition, although
their degrees of application of active teaching methods are not the same, both “junior liberals”
and “conservatives”have a low level of empowerment of and trust in their students.
Theoretical implications
University lecturers, like other groups, are not a homogenous entity (Finnegan, 1993;May
et al., 2013). There are lecturers who facilitate active teaching methods alongside those who do
not (Admiraal et al., 2017;Tao and Yeh, 2008). Similarly, there are university lecturers who
have trust in and empower their students working in the same universities as those who do
not. Interestingly, trust and empowerment, the invisible and visible parts of lecturers’
attitudes toward their students (Jones, 1996;Niemi, 2002), may also affect the lecturers’
attitudes toward the active teaching methods. However, these two factors may not necessarily
be the only critical conditions for applying the new teaching methods (Curzon-Hobson, 2002;
Tan, 2004). For example, although they have a high level of trust and empowerment, certain
lecturers are found to be somewhat unenthusiastic with regards to active teaching methods.
From another perspective, the lecturers’thinking styles and emotional intelligence may be
other internal facilitators or inhibitors to applying active teaching methods (Pennington, 1996).
However, this does not hold true for all university teaching staff, which is similar to the
situation of trust and empowerment mentioned earlier. Forexample, certain lecturers may have
a high self-rated emotional intelligence yet choose not to carry out active teaching methods.
Moreover, some lecturers may consider themselves creative thinkers yet also choose not to
follow these methods. Considering this observation, the importance of external facilitators,
such as support and cooperation, should not be neglected (Carless, 2003;Lam et al.,2010).
On an additional note, this study found that biological sex, an overt variable, is not a
significant indicator of lecturers’attitudes toward active teaching methods, which is different
from previous findings (Wang et al.,2010). Thus, the aprioridifferentiation or segmentation of
a university teaching staff based on biological sex may not be a reliable approach in certain
cases. Otherwise, covert variables, such as thinking styles and emotional intelligence, can be
employed as additional segmentation criteria since their reliability and usefulness have been
observed.
Practical implications
Theoretically, the values and benefits of active teaching methods (e.g. autonomy and
individuality) may not be compatible with the traditional thoughts and behaviors of the
Vietnamese society, which are based on communality and dependency (Hofstede et al., 2010;
Application of Active Methods
Empowerment
and Trust
Cluster 2
Liberals
Cluster 3
Junior Conservatives
Cluster 4
Junior Liberals
Cluster 1
Conservatives
High
Low
High Low
Figure 1.
Position of the clusters
JABES

Nguyen and Tran, 2018;Truong et al., 2017). However, this study observed that a significant
proportion of Vietnamese university lecturers (“liberals”and “junior conservatives”) have a
relatively high level of trust in their students and are trying to empower them. More than half
of the lecturers in these clusters are using active teaching methods on a relatively regular
basis. To a lesser extent, although possessing a relatively low level of trust in their students
and not empowering them very much, another proportion of the Vietnamese university
lecturers have also chosen to use these new methods. This implies that any reform of
Vietnam’s higher education system using the more active approaches has a certain degree of
internal support from the university teaching staff. Nevertheless, there still is a certain degree
of lack of engagement within the same population. In order to successfully achieve the
ultimate goals of education modernization, the identification of uninterested lecturers is a
very important task. From there, strategies to reeducate or to change the attitude of these
lecturers, especially the external factors, can be proposed.
Other countries, especially those with unstandardized university teaching staff (e.g. being
relatively young in age, lacking in experiences or not holding suitable academic degrees), may
refer to the current situation in Vietnam to improve their own education reforms. Specifically,
external supports (e.g. moral and financial) could be given to the lecturers who trust and
empower their students yet still hesitate to apply new teaching methods. In addition,
reevaluation may be considered for lecturers who have low levels of emotional intelligence,
trust and empowerment. Moreover, recruitment of new lecturers must consider, from the very
beginning, the personal characteristics of the candidates in order to ensure that those who are
compatible with the purposes of education reforms or modernization are selected.
Concluding remarks
The outcomes of the survey conducted in Hanoi (Vietnam) revealed that the university
lecturers there have an average tendency to apply active teaching methods, as well as to trust
in and empower their students. In addition, applying the segmentation method used in
marketing research, this study identified four different clusters in the sample. The study
found that the intensity of applying active teaching methods may be affected by the level of
trust in students and student empowerment. In addition, whether these methods are used or
not may also be influenced by covert internal characteristics of the lecturers, for example,
thinking styles and emotional intelligence. The lecturers’overt characteristics, such as age,
education and experience, may impact their implementation of active teaching methods, while
biological sex may not play a significant role. These findings have extended the literature on
the application of active teaching methods by revealing the diversity of university lecturers,
as well as the relative contribution of the abovementioned overt and covert factors.
Limitations and future directions
Several limitations of this study, nonetheless, should be noted. First, the measures used in the
questionnaire were originally developed for other contexts. The translation and
interpretation of certain items might be unintentionally biased by the researchers and the
respondents. To address these issues, future studies in Vietnam may expand their efforts to
develop their own measures. Qualitative methods such as focus group interviews and
discussions can help generate more relevant items (Rattray and Jones, 2007).
Second, the sample was generated through a nonrandom method. The number of national
universities (n55) well exceeded that of private university (n51). The setting was also
limited to one major city in Vietnam. Therefore, the data, and thus, the findings may not be a
perfect representation of university teachers, even just in Vietnam. In addition, several
environmental or external factors, such as the ownership and specializations of the
universities, were not taken into account, given the purpose of the study and the size of
Active
teaching
methods

the sample. Thus, the impacts of these factors, if there are any, could not be detected either. In
the future, other studies may be repeated with larger and more differentiated samples in order
to ascertain the existence of varied clusters of university lecturers and to identify the impacts
of environmental factors.
Third, the number of steps in active teaching methods identified for this study is small
(n53). One of them was even removed when undertaking the segmentation attempt. In
addition, these steps were defined to reflect active teaching methods in general, not particular
approaches taken (Prince and Felder, 2007). In the future, other studies may focus on one
particular approach and then generate a larger pool of nominal practices to better evaluate
the application of that specific approach.
Last, but not least, there may be certain correlations between the application of active
teaching methods and other covert characteristics of the lecturers (thinking styles and
emotional intelligence). However, this tendency was only observed through a segmentation
analysis. In the future, other studies may structurally examine these correlations to verify the
real contribution of the overt factors to the application of active teaching methods.
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About the authors
B

ınh Nghi^
em-Ph
u is currently an Assistant Professor at the School of Economics and Management,
University of Hyogo, Japan. He is doing research in the fields of applied psychology, marketing, and
tourism. B

ınh Nghi^
em-Ph
u is the corresponding author and can be contacted at: binhnghiem@
gmail.com
Th
anh Hưng Nguyễn is currently a lecturer at Thuongmai University, Vietnam. The focus of his
research is accounting and auditing in Vietnam. The two authors have been working together in several
studies in Vietnam, including these about students’and practitioners’perception of accountants and
accountancy, students’attitude toward domestic and foreign education institutions, and users’
evaluation of banking services. An interdisciplinary approach and a mixed method have been employed
in these studies.
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