Examining the HEAT inventory and understanding approaches to teaching in higher education: Study

Liisa Postareff (Häme University of Applied Sciences), Juulia Lahdenperä (Häme), Telle Hailikari (Häme), and Anna Parpala (University of Helsinki) have published a study on approaches to teaching and the validity of the Higher Education Approaches to Teaching (HEAT) inventory. The HEAT inventory captures four dimensions identified in teaching approaches: interactivity, information transmission, reflectivity, and organized teaching. In addition to these, the researchers also examined the impact of teachers’ self-efficacy. The authors state that their analysis confirmed that HEAT “is a robust instrument” and discuss the relationships they found between the different dimensions and self-efficacy.