English

Adjective

holist ‎(not comparable)

1. (education, of a learning strategy) That concentrates on forming an overview of the topic.
   • 2000, Francis M. Quinn, The Principles and Practice of Nurse Education, page 34,

     Pask suggests that these strategies reflect basic learning styles; holist strategies reflect a comprehension learning style and serialist strategies an operation learning style.

   • 2001, Howard Hills, Team-based Learning, page 87,

     Pask described the two strategies as 'holist' and 'serialist'. […] Learners who adopt a holist strategy (described as comprehension learners) like to get an overview of a topic.

   • 2012, David H. Jonassen, Barbara L. Grabowski, Handbook of Individual Differences Learning and Instruction, page 209,

     The serialist/holist cognitive style is a measure of a bipolar information-processing strategy that describes the way that learners select and represent information (Pask, 1976; Pask & Scott, 1972).

Coordinate terms

• (education): serialist

Noun

holist ‎(plural holists)

1. A believer in, or practitioner of, holism; one who believes that a topic of study cannot be fully understood by studying the parts, or who studies by considering the whole.
   • 2003, Anna Basso, Aphasia and Its Therapy, page 21,

     The holists generally claimed that the variety of the clinical pictures was not intrinsic to aphasia, although it was recognized that aphasic patients differ in many respects, not only the severity of the language disorder.

2. (sociology) One who advocates studying society as a whole, and who consistently interprets the actions of individuals in that context.
   • 1991, Jack Snyder, 5: Science and Sovietology: Bridging the Methods Gap in Soviet Foreign Policy Studies, Erik P. Hoffmann, Robbin Frederick Laird, Frederic J. Fleron (editors), Soviet Foreign Policy, 2009, page 132,

     Holism is more eclectic in its methods; for most holists, rigor means reconstructing the meaning of an action in the subject's own terms, and interpreting it in light of a richly detailed cultural, social, and historical context.

   • 2006, Mario Bunge, 1: A systemic perspective on crime, Per-Olof H. Wikström, Robert J. Sampson (editors), The Explanation of Crime: Context, Mechanisms and Development, page 9,

     By contrast, the holists, like Emile Durkheim, regard individual action as only a reaction to pressures exerted by society as a whole: they are right in stressing the social embeddedness of individual action.

3. (education) One who prefers to learn by forming an overview of the topic.
   • 2000, Francis M. Quinn, The Principles and Practice of Nurse Education, page 34,

     Those subjects using a serialist strategy tended to proceed in a step-by-step manner, whereas the holists adopted a more global approach to what was to be learned.

   • 2001, Howard Hills, Team-based Learning, page 87,

     They^[serialists] learn rules, methods and details more readily than the holists.

   • 2012, David H. Jonassen, Barbara L. Grabowski, Handbook of Individual Differences Learning and Instruction, page 209,

     Holists use a global, thematic approach to learning by concentrating first on building broad descriptions. […] The holist then uses complex links to relate mutileveled information.

Coordinate terms

• (believer in or practitioner of holism): reductionist
• (education): serialist

Related terms

• holistic
• holism

Translations

See also

• positivism
• reductionism

Anagrams

• thiols