Retention of prose materials as a function of postacquisition testing.

Abstract

One-week prose retention was examined as a function of four activities immediately following reading. Completion questions as an immediate activity with knowledge of results produced significantly better delayed retention than did questions without knowledge of results or presentation of statements equivalent in information to the questions with knowledge of results. These three conditions yielded performance significantly superior to the nonactivity control. Knowledge of results did not increase retention for correctly answered immediate questions, and it significantly increased delayed performance for immediate questions incorrectly answered. The immediate activity facilitation findings were attributed to two processes, practice at retrieval of stored information and addition of answers to items not recallable immediately after reading. No delayed retention difference occurred between passage information and equivalent randomly presented statements.