Learner-generated organizational aids: Effects on learning from text.

Compared the effects on learning from text of 4 contexts (topic sentences, headings, related sentences, and unrelated sentences) when they were generated by readers or provided in text. 133 female undergraduates read a 522-word passage based on 15 related topics within a conceptual hierarchy on minerals, and performance under each of the treatments was examined on a free recall test, matching test, and test for knowledge of passage structure. The contexts had differential effects on knowledge of passage structure only when they were generated; readers who generated topic sentences recalled more than all other learners. The provided contexts had no effect on knowledge of passage structure but increased recall of subordinate information over generated contexts. (28 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Organization and comprehensibility in scientific proofs: or, "Consider a particle p…"

Scientific texts commonly present principles by first giving a proof and only afterward stating the principle—a "proof-first" organization. This specialized text structure differs from conventional structures in that it lacks thematic information to guide text processing. The current research examined the effects on comprehension of this proof-first organization. This was done by comparing the processing of proof-first texts to that of "principle-first" texts, in which the theme (i.e., the principle) is stated at the beginning. Readers had more difficulty determining what was important when reading proof-first texts and reorganized proof-first texts into a principle-first structure when summarizing. The proof-first organization also decreased recall of the principle. These results suggest that, compared with a principle-first structure, the proof-first structure increases processing difficulty and results in a less complete text representation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)