ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Educational Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1491265
Impact of microlearning on developing soft skills of university students across disciplines
Provisionally accepted
Haozhun Luo*
Weiyan Li- Southwest University, Chongqing, China
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{With the broader aim of evaluating the impact of microlearning on developing specific soft skills of university students across various academic disciplines, this study investigates how microlearning interventions can influence the development of teamwork skill (TWS), leadership skill (LS), communication skill (CS), time management skill (TMS), and emotional intelligence (EI). Unlike existing articles, this study bridges the gap between academic training and industry expectations by analyzing specific soft skill improvements across humanities and arts (HA), business studies (BS), medical sciences (MS), and technical and engineering (TE) students, while primarily seeking to determine which disciplines benefit the most from microlearning intervention in developing each specific soft skill. Accordingly, this study gathered responses of 384 Chinese university students achieving a questionnaire recovery rate of 93.23\% with nearly equal participation from each discipline, and conducted various statistical analyses, including paired sample t-test, independent sample t-test, and effect size analysis, to validate the five proposed hypotheses. Current results establish that leadership-oriented modules are particularly beneficial for TE and MS students, whereas EI training is most valuable for BS students. Post-intervention improvements in CS and TMS among BS and TE students align with corporate project management demands, while leadership development in TE and MS students facilitates their transition into managerial roles. Thus, this study pleads university administrators to integrate structured microlearning into curricula to enhance soft skills across disciplines. Professors can incorporate scenario-based modules into traditional teaching to boost student engagement, whereas higher education institutions need to prioritize candidates with microlearning experience and develop industry-specific training programs. EdTech developers should provide advanced AI-driven, interactive microlearning solutions for personalized learning. Also, young adults should actively engage themselves in specific microlearning modules for academic and professional success.
Keywords: Microlearning for various academic disciplines, soft skill development of university student, teamwork and leadership skills, communication and time management skills, Emotional Intelligence, China
Received: 04 Sep 2024; Accepted: 17 Mar 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Luo and Li. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Haozhun Luo, Southwest University, Chongqing, China
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