purpose: based on a quasi-experimental design, this study sought to investigate the effects of two different cognitive styles, fi eld independence and fi eld dependence, on students' learning behaviors of online database search strategies.

design/methodology/approach: an experiment was carried out among senior students in a chinese university.

findings: the field independent (fi) subjects performed better in terms of their search strategy scores. when comparing how many people in each cognitive style group learned the targeted search strategies, more field dependent (fd) subjects were successors, whereas the fi subjects were more inclined to learn from their past experience. when analyzing the reasons for the subjects' selection of search strategies, we found that the fi subjects demonstrated more rational thinking behaviors than the fd subjects.

research limitations: only 28 students participated in the study, which was a relatively small sample size. a larger sample will give more information and therefore more precise results.

practical implications: this research can provide some suggestions to the information system designers on how the system interface can be better designed to suit the cognitive styles of different users.

originality/value: so far, few studies have been published about the effects of users' cognitive styles on their learning behaviors of online database search strategies.