The personal characteristics of university lecturers in Libyan universities

Abstract

This thesis was undertaken to investigate students’ perceptions of the personal characteristics of university lecturers in Libyan universities. These perceptions were investigated using three measures. These included two scales translated for the first time from English into Arabic: the ‘Index of Learning Style’ (Felder & Soloman, 1988); and Goldberg’s personality scale (Goldberg, 1999) to measure students’ learning styles and personality types; and the main study questionnaire developed by the researcher (‘the personal characteristics of university lecturer’s questionnaire’). The main sample in the current thesis comprised 431 students from a Libyan public university (Sebha University). This sample was divided into four groups focusing on four aspects of the research: (1) group 1 was focused on determining the personal characteristics which students believe that a good university lecturer should have; (2) group 2 aimed to identify characteristics seen by students as insignificant for being a good university lecturer; (3) group 3 aimed to ascertain the students’ perspectives on the extent to which these characteristics were observed in their best lecturers; and (4) group 4 was also focused on determining through the students’ perspective the extent to which these characteristics were observed, but in the lecturer who they preferred least