Prose Material Research Articles

Retention of prose materials as a function of postacquisition testing.

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.

Some methods for examining content structure and cognitive structure in instruction1

Abstract Reform in science and mathematics curricula has moved from rote learning of facts and computation skills toward learning a structure of a subject matter. While the reasons for this shift, such as greater understanding, transfer and intellectual excitement are admirable, there is little empirical evidence to support them. A first step in examining such claims is to develop methodology for representing structure in the to‐be‐learned instructional material and in students' memories. The purposes of this paper, then, are to present (a) a method for examining a subject‐matter structure in prose materials, (b) methods for examining a subject‐matter structure in students’ memories, and (c) data bearing on the validity of structural interpretations of these measures. If these structures can be represented objectively and independently — even if not in a complete form or error free — a beginning has been made in validating the reasons for teaching structure.

Effects of Recitation on the Acquisition of Prose

An attempt was made to evaluate the application of recitation as a prose study skill. A read-recite procedure patterned on that of Gates (3) was compared to a read?reread condition. Recitation was found to be incremental in the mastery of a prose passage as measured by both an immediate and a delayed cued recall test, although no differential retention occurred. RESEARCH IN study skills has uncovered few procedures which are superior to reading and re reading a prose passage. The presentation of the passage can be manipulated in various ways to enhance acquisition of selected parts such as with cueing (2) or with the use of adjunct questions (e.g., 4, 8, 9). If the presentation of the passage is held constant, however, most commonly used study skills such as underlining (5), note-taking, and outlining (1, 6) do not result in superior ac quisition as compared to reading and rereading the passage for an equivalent amount of time. A potential exception is a study skill long used in the memorization of non-prose materials. This technique, most often called recitation, consists of first reading a given unit of material and then attempting to recall everything read. Continual referral to the passage is used as an aid in this recalling (recitation) stage to correct errors and omissions. The most extensive evaluation (3) of this procedure employed both lists of nonsense syllables and short biographies. The biographies used would not be considered prose by most con ventional definitions since they were comprised of only six to seven facts usually not in complete sentence form. Gates studied different proportions of reading to recitation as well as the relative effectiveness of the method for children and adults. His findings were quite impressive, indi cating that reading followed by recitation was far superior to reading alone. Peterson (7) attempted to extend Gates' reci tation procedure to prose passages (over 2,000 words) and concluded that recitation as a study skill was not superior to reading alone. In Peter son's adaptation of the Gates procedure, however, Ss were not allowed to refer to the passage after initial reading. Thus it is hard to argue, as Peter son dic^ that recitation is an impotent technique when prose constitutes the learning material, in asmuch as recitation of prose materials is as yet unevaluated. The purpose of the present study, then, was to provide such a test by comparing recitation to reading alone in the acquisition of facts contained in a prose passage.

Effects of position and type of question on learning from prose material: Interaction of treatments with individual differences.

Effects of position and type of question on learning from prose material: Interaction of treatments with individual differences.

The role of active questions in learning and retention of prose material

Questions may be (i) active i.e. asked by subjects or (ii) passive i.e. offered to subjects as problems for solution. It was hypothesized that active questions would be effective in facilitating the learning and retention of prose material when subjects were faced with a challenge to their competence. 47 subjects, boys and girls aged 13–14 years were exposed to an “easy” 300-word passage of biographical prose. 30 subjects were then exposed to a “difficult” 450-word passage. Treatments were: (1) Questions, active-Subjects read a summary, then wrote questions; (2) Questions, passive-Subjects read the summary and the experimenter's questions; (3) Questions, active and passive-Subjects both wrote questions and read the experimenter's questions; (4) Reading, double-Subjects read the summary and the complete passage; (5) Reading, single-Subjects read the complete passage only. With “easy” prose, girls and low verbal ability subjects gained from questioning, particularly passive questions. With “difficult” prose, all subjects gained from questioning. Boys and low verbal ability subjects gained most from active questions, high verbal ability subjects from passive questions. Results are discussed in the light of work regarding cognitive structures, and the hypothesized challenge to competence.

Memory for Logical Structure and Verbal Units in Prose Material at Increased Rates of Presentation

Prose material was presented at rates which were faster than normal reading rates by 0, 50, 100, and 200 words per minute. Two forms of memory for the material were examined: (a) memory for logical relationships between groups in the passages and (b) memory for the words in the material. As the rate of presentation increased, memory for logical structure decreased while memory for specific words did not. A comparison of relative changes in the two forms of memory showed that logical structure decreased more than specific words. This result demonstrates that, when information-processing capacity is limited by speeded presentation, more highly coded information such as logical relations is less adequately retained than less highly coded information such as specific words.

The “Arousal” Effect of adjunct questions on recall from prose materials

Abstract Two Experiments tested the hypothesis that answering questions inserted in instructional materials will differentially affect short and long term recall. In Experiment I fifth and sixth-grade children read passages under conditions of high or low “arousal” as defined by their previous experience with adjunct questions. In Experiment II the same conditions were replicated with Test Anxiety controlled. While there was support for the direct practice effect of adjunct questions, there was no evidence from either experiment to indicate the influence of any “arousal” effect from encountering these questions. These results fail to support strong effects previously reported.

Understanding, information processing, and learning from prose materials.

Understanding, information processing, and learning from prose materials.

Organization of prose materials: Stimulus, storage, and retrieval.

Organization of prose materials: Stimulus, storage, and retrieval.

Direction of the effect of questions in prose material.

Direction of the effect of questions in prose material.

The free recall and category clustering of factual material presented in complex sentences

Lists of complex sentences taken from four factual articles were arranged in either a blocked or random order. These two lists and an additional list of 16 unrelated sentences were used to investigate free recall and clustering of prose material. Information given to Ss as to the clusterable nature of the material also varied. Results showed that Ss in the informed blocked condition performed better in both immediate and delayed recall and in clustering than those in any other condition. However, a more interesting finding was that the informed random group scored significantly higher than the uninformed random group. Moreover, because the uninformed random group and the group presented with unrelated sentences did not vary significantly, it appears that cueing, and not the list structure, was the more important factor influencing recall and clustering of factual material.

SELECTION OF PROSE MATERIAL FOR TESTING

The study investigated teachers' selection of prose material for testing. Thirty elementary school social studies teachers wrote test questions based on a 1900 word passage from a commercial social studies text. Moderate consensus was observed among the teachers as to those segments of the passage chosen for testing. Additional analyses to determine the characteristics of the passage segments selected for testing were performed. The most frequently selected text segments were sentences which either contained a list or were themselves an entry in a list.

Effects of delay of feedback and length of postfeedback interval on retention of prose material

Psychology in the SchoolsVolume 9, Issue 2 p. 194-197 General Effects of delay of feedback and length of postfeedback interval on retention of prose material Julius M. Sassenrath, Julius M. Sassenrath University of California, DavisSearch for more papers by this author Julius M. Sassenrath, Julius M. Sassenrath University of California, DavisSearch for more papers by this author First published: April 1972 https://doi.org/10.1002/1520-6807(197204)9:2<194::AID-PITS2310090216>3.0.CO;2-DCitations: 8AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Citing Literature Volume9, Issue2April 1972Pages 194-197 RelatedInformation

Storage and Retrieval of Prose Material

72 Ss studied a prose passage under the same conditions of input. Two conditions of recall were compared: free recall in which as much of the passage was recalled as was possible, and question recall in which specific questions were answered. In both conditions, the major interest was in retrieval of the information that answered the questions used in question recall. Questions facilitated retrieval of this answer information from the latter portions of the input passage much more than from the initial portions. Several possible explanations were discussed.

A behavioral index of the exploratory value of prose materials.

A behavioral index of the exploratory value of prose materials.

A Critical Review of Mathemagenic Behaviors and the Effect of Questions upon the Retention of Prose Materials

The recent research on the effect of questions upon the retention of prose materials was critically reviewed with respect to four important determining variables—material difficulty, individual ability, learning time, and learning strategy. A detailed analysis of the literature suggested the following: (a) a failure to adequately control for the learning time and strategy variables has rendered the recent research ungeneralizable to important theoretical and applied situations, and (b) the concept of mathemagenic behavior is a barbarism that contributes more to confusion of thinking than to clarity of thinking. It was concluded that behavior should be relegated to a secondary role in future research on learning from prose, and that the investigation of learning strategies should be elevated to a primary role.

Prose Learning: Effects of Pretesting and Reduction of Passage Length

The study was designed to investigate the learning and retention of prose materials. Immediate and 1-wk retention was examined in Ss who had either read a 2,300-word passage (LP) on science fiction or a 300-word short passage (SP). The short passage was derived from the information retained over a 1-wk period by Ss who read and learned the long passage. Retention was assessed by a 30-item multiple-choice test based upon information in the long passage. One-way analysis of variance of posttest scores from 200 adults indicated that for 1-wk retention the short passage was retained significantly ( p &lt; .01) better than the long one. There was no significant difference on immediate retention. The results were discussed in terms of current cognitive learning theory, prose-learning paradigms, and classroom procedures related to the presentation of new material.

Retroactive interference in reading prose materials.

Retroactive interference in reading prose materials.

Retention of prose material as a function of rate of presentation and difficulty of material

Retention of prose material as a function of rate of presentation and difficulty of material

Leveling-Sharpening and Representational Learning

Performance of college students on the Squares Test was related to immediate and delayed recognition of unfamiliar concept names in a representational learning task. Although previous research has not substantiated predictions from the assimilation model when the task involved associative learning, the present study clearly indicated ( p &lt; .01) the superiority of “sharpeners” to “levelers” in representational learning with the stimulus phrases embedded in prose material and low-meaning response terms.