Unsuccessful retrieval attempts enhance subsequent learning.

Taking tests enhances learning. But what happens when one cannot answer a test question—does an unsuccessful retrieval attempt impede future learning or enhance it? The authors examined this question using materials that ensured that retrieval attempts would be unsuccessful. In Experiments 1 and 2, participants were asked fictional general-knowledge questions (e.g., “What peace treaty ended the Calumet War?”). In Experiments 3–6, participants were shown a cue word (e.g., whale) and were asked to guess a weak associate (e.g., mammal); the rare trials on which participants guessed the correct response were excluded from the analyses. In the test condition, participants attempted to answer the question before being shown the answer; in the read-only condition, the question and answer were presented together. Unsuccessful retrieval attempts enhanced learning with both types of materials. These results demonstrate that retrieval attempts enhance future learning; they also suggest that taking challenging tests—instead of avoiding errors—may be one key to effective learning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The pretesting effect: Do unsuccessful retrieval attempts enhance learning?

Testing previously studied information enhances long-term memory, particularly when the information is successfully retrieved from memory. The authors examined the effect of unsuccessful retrieval attempts on learning. Participants in 5 experiments read an essay about vision. In the test condition, they were asked about embedded concepts before reading the passage; in the extended study condition, they were given a longer time to read the passage. To distinguish the effects of testing from attention direction, the authors emphasized the tested concepts in both conditions, using italics or bolded keywords or, in Experiment 5, by presenting the questions but not asking participants to answer them before reading the passage. Posttest performance was better in the test condition than in the extended study condition in all experiments—a pretesting effect—even though only items that were not successfully retrieved on the pretest were analyzed. The testing effect appears to be attributable, in part, to the role unsuccessful tests play in enhancing future learning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stability and variability in extinction.

Some studies have found that extinction leaves response structures unaltered; others have found that response variability is increased. Responding by Long-Evans rats was extinguished after 3 schedules. In one, reinforcement depended on repetitions of a particular response sequence across 3 operanda. In another, sequences were reinforced only if they varied. In the third, reinforcement was yoked: not contingent upon repetitions or variations. In all cases, rare sequences increased during extinction—variability increased—but the ordering of sequence probabilities was generally unchanged, the most common sequences during reinforcement continuing to be most frequent in extinction. The rats' combination of generally doing what worked before but occasionally doing something very different may maximize the possibility of reinforcement from a previously bountiful source while providing necessary variations for new learning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Study efficacy and the region of proximal learning framework.

One of the most important reasons to investigate human metacognition is its role in directing how people study. However, limited evidence exists that metacognitively guided study benefits learning. Three experiments are presented that provide evidence for this link. In Experiment 1, participants' learning was enhanced when they were allowed to control what they studied. Experiments 2a-d replicated this finding and showed contributions of self-regulated study to learning. Experiments 3a and 3b showed that, when forced to choose among items they did not know, participants chose the easiest items and benefited from doing so, providing evidence for the link between metacognitive monitoring/control and learning, and supporting the region of proximal learning model of study-time allocation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The Dynamics of Learning and Allocation of Study Time to a Region of Proximal Learning.

In contrast to the dominant discrepancy reduction model, which favors the most difficult items, people, given free choice, devoted most time to medium-difficulty items and studied the easiest items first. When study time was experimentally manipulated, best performance resulted when most time was given to the medium-difficulty items. Empirically determined information uptake functions revealed steep initial learning for easy items with little subsequent increase. For medium-difficulty items, initial gains were smaller but more sustained, suggesting that the strategy people had used, when given free choice, was largely appropriate. On the basis of the information uptake functions, a negative spacing effect was predicted and observed in the final experiment. Overall, the results favored the region of proximal learning framework. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A stability bias in human memory: Overestimating remembering and underestimating learning.

The dynamics of human memory are complex and often unintuitive, but certain features—such as the fact that studying results in learning—seem like common knowledge. In 12 experiments, however, participants who were told they would be allowed to study a list of word pairs between 1 and 4 times and then take a cued-recall test predicted little or no learning across trials, notwithstanding their large increases in actual learning. When queried directly, the participants espoused the belief that studying results in learning, but they showed little evidence of that belief in the actual task. These findings, when combined with A. Koriat, R. A. Bjork, L. Sheffer, and S. K. Bar’s (2004) research on judgments of forgetting, suggest a stability bias in human memory—that is, a tendency to assume that the accessibility of one’s memories will remain relatively stable over time rather than benefiting from future learning or suffering from future forgetting. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Spacing as the friend of both memory and induction in young and older adults.

We compared the effects of spaced versus massed practice on young and older adults' ability to learn visually complex paintings. We expected a spacing advantage when 1 painting per artist was studied repeatedly and tested (repetition) but perhaps a massing advantage, especially for older adults, when multiple different paintings by each artist were studied and tested (induction). We were surprised to find that spacing facilitated both inductive and repetition learning by both young and older adults, even though the participants rated massing superior to spacing for inductive learning. Thus, challenging learners of any age appears to have unintuitive benefits for both memory and induction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)