Spaced Retrieval Research Articles

Recent developments in mobile-assisted vocabulary learning: a mini review of published studies focusing on digital flashcards

This mini review provides a concise overview of recent developments in mobile-assisted vocabulary learning (MAVL) and compares its effectiveness to traditional methods in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) settings. The review synthesizes findings from recent empirical studies, highlighting how MAVL, particularly digital flashcards, promotes learner autonomy, engagement, and long-term vocabulary retention through features like spaced repetition and gamification. Traditional methods such as paper flashcards, while effective in structured classroom settings, lack the interactive and personalized benefits of MAVL. The review also discusses existing research gaps, including the need for further investigation into productive vocabulary use and long-term retention. Future developments in the field may include hybrid approaches that combine the strengths of both traditional and digital methods. This review aims to provide language teachers and researchers with an up-to-date understanding of MAVL and its potential to enhance EFL vocabulary acquisition.

Rapid Learning in Frontline Grocery Workers During the COVID‐19 Pandemic

ABSTRACTProlonged stress and the need for rapid uptake of information can have detrimental effects on memory and cognition, whereas meaningfulness of study material and motivation to learn can have positive effects. How do these opposing conditions impact workplace learning in essential frontline workers during a global pandemic? We analyzed learning data collected longitudinally since before the pandemic in over 85,000 essential frontline grocery workers and nonessential telecommunications workers via a learning management system that incorporates a spaced retrieval schedule, where items are retrieved following retention intervals of varying length. Findings indicate more rapid knowledge uptake in grocery workers (a) during than before the pandemic, (b) for COVID‐19‐related content than non‐COVID content, and (c) in the United States than in Canada. Longer‐term maintenance of training material was similar across groups. Evidence of enhanced workplace learning and retention supports efforts to integrate empirically based strategies from the behavioral sciences into learning‐based technologies.

ENHANCING ELS STUDENTS’ LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY THROUGH SPACED REPETITION

In language learning, the method of spaced repetition has gained significant importance. It is undoubtedly a learning technique that can greatly enhance students' vocabulary and grammar acquisition. Spaced repetition allows to improve students' long-term retention of the language content they study enhancing language learning through active engagement, repetition, and visual aids. The effectiveness of spaced repetition as a method of improving English language acquisition was investigated by the authors of the paper. The participants of the research were students at the National Technical University of Ukraine "Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute." The experiment involved 76 students, who were divided into two groups: an experimental group and a control group. The experimental group applied spaced repetition to their vocabulary and grammar learning, while the control group continued their studies according to the traditional syllabus without the use of spaced repetition. To assess the impact of spaced repetition, both groups took the same test before and after the experiment. The pre-test served to establish a baseline measurement of each student's vocabulary and grammar proficiency, allowing for a direct comparison of progress made during the study. The post-test, conducted at the end of the experiment, aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of the spaced repetition method by measuring any improvements in language skills. Data was collected through a combination of online surveys and a Likert scale questionnaire. The results demonstrated that the majority of students in the experimental group, who consistently used spaced repetition, reported significant improvements in their language skills, as evidenced by higher scores on the post-experiment test. In contrast, the control group showed less pronounced progress, highlighting the added value of spaced repetition in language learning. The findings underline the versatility and effectiveness of spaced repetition, especially when integrated into the daily learning process. This method not only proved its effectiveness for memorization but also enhanced the practical application of language skills, leading to more confident and accurate communication in English. Additionally, students in the experimental group reported positive impacts on their motivation and time management, further supporting the potential of spaced repetition as a powerful tool for language education across various linguistic fields.

The role of variable retrieval in effective learning

Current research on memory indicates that learning is most effective when it involves spaced retrieval practice of study materials. Here, we investigated whether the benefits of both retrieval practice and spacing can be further boosted when variability is introduced across practice sessions. Across six experiments, participants learned translations of foreign vocabulary, with foreign words embedded in contextual sentences hinting at the meaning of these words. These sentences were then either kept constant or varied from one learning cycle to another. Whenever repeated practice took the form of retrieval from long-term memory with contextual sentences serving as cues (with or without feedback after retrieval attempts), variable sentences led to better learning of the meanings of the embedded foreign words than constant sentences. The benefits of variable retrieval were observed both immediately after study and after a 24-h delay, and they were larger when retrieval practice was spaced rather than massed. However, these benefits were not appreciated by the learners who judged learning to be more effective with constant rather than variable cues. This metacognitive illusion, misaligning the effectiveness of learning and its appraisal by learners, was confirmed in the seventh experiment which focused on learning lecture content. Thus, while spaced retrieval practice employing variable cues clearly produces robust benefits for memory performance, such benefits may be severely underappreciated by the learners.

Intricacies of Using Spaced Repetition Tools

I was really intrigued to read an article by Cooper et al. that described how using spaced repetition study techniques raised GPA, USMLE Step 1, and COMLEX Level 1 results. In addition, I appreciate the writers' efforts in spreading the word about this special study technique that has been shown to improve grades. I do want to draw attention to a few areas of concern with this approach including the proper usage of the software as well as certain things that could have affected and altered the results of the study.

Usage of Spaced Repetition Flashcards to Improve Educational Outcomes in Microbiology.

Introduction: Spaced repetition flashcards and other instructor-made resources are beneficial tools for students in content-dense introductory courses, particularly in the sciences. This study seeks to evaluate whether instructor-made, spaced repetition flashcards affect students' performance on the exams and their self-concept as it pertains to a newly introduced discipline (microbiology). Methods: Students enrolled in a bachelor's level introductory microbiology course utilized a spaced repetition flashcard software to scaffold their review of course material productively. Exam scores and student perceptual data from institutionally validated surveys were then compared using parametric T-testing. Results: While overall performance on the exams was unchanged (p = 0.2657), there were significant changes in student perception. Most notably, students' confidence in their ability to succeed improved (p = 0.0066), along with their belief that the course made them think like a microbiologist (p = 0.0011). They also felt that this was an effective instructional approach (p = 0.0076). Conclusion: These results suggest that students can better engage with and feel confident in understanding the material presented, even if their exam scores did not drastically improve. Further studies should evaluate how resources like the one trialed here can be implemented to improve students' self-concept and learning.

Learning Verbs in Sentences: Children With Developmental Language Disorder and the Role of Retrieval Practice.

Retrieval practice has been shown to assist the word learning of children with developmental language disorder (DLD). Although this has been true for learning new verbs as well as new nouns and adjectives, these children's overall verb learning has remained quite low. In this preregistered study, we presented novel verbs in transitive sentences with varying subjects/agents and objects/patients to determine if recall could be improved and if retrieval practice continued to be facilitative. Fourteen children with DLD aged 4-5 years and 13 same-age peers with typical language development (TD) learned eight novel verbs over two sessions. Half of the novel verbs were presented with spacing between study and retrieval trials, and half were presented with the same frequency in study trials without the opportunity for retrieval. All novel verbs were presented in sentences such as, "The woman is deeking the shoe." Children's ability to recall and use the novel verbs in the same sentence structure was tested after the second session and 1 week later. The children were also required to use the novel verbs in bare-stem form in a new structure, as in, "That woman likes to deek the towel." Both groups of children showed increased recall relative to a previous novel verb study. The children with TD showed the expected advantages of spaced retrieval over repeated study and could use the novel verbs in the new morphological form and sentence structure. The children with DLD, however, showed an advantage for spaced retrieval only shortly after the learning period. These children had great difficulty changing the novel verbs to a bare stem and using them in a new structure. Although spaced retrieval assists children's novel verb recall, children with DLD in particular require additional help using these verbs with morphological and syntactic flexibility.

180 AI-Enhanced Spaced Repetition in Emergency Medicine Education

180 AI-Enhanced Spaced Repetition in Emergency Medicine Education

The Effect of Spaced Repetition on Learning and Knowledge Transfer in a Large Cohort of Practicing Physicians.

Spaced repetition is superior to repeated study for learning and knowledge retention, but literature on the effect of different spaced repetition strategies is lacking. The authors evaluated the effects of different spaced repetition strategies on long-term knowledge retention and transfer. This prospective cohort study, conducted from October 1, 2020, through July 20, 2023, used the American Board of Family Medicine Continuous Knowledge Self-Assessment (CKSA) to assess learning and knowledge transfer of diplomates and residents. Participants were randomized to a control group or 1 of 5 spaced repetition conditions during 5 calendar quarters (January 1, 2021, to March 31, 2022). Participants in the spaced repetition groups received 6 repeated questions once or twice. Incorrectly but confidently answered questions were prioritized for repetition, with decreasing priority for questions answered incorrectly with lesser confidence. All participants received 6 rewritten questions corresponding to their initial questions chosen for repetition in quarter 10 (second quarter of calendar year 2023). A total of 26,258 family physicians or residents who completed the CKSA in the baseline period were randomized. Spaced repetition was superior to no spaced repetition for learning at quarter 6 (58.03% vs 43.20%, P < .001, Cohen d = 0.62) and knowledge transfer at quarter 10 (58.33% vs 52.39%, P < .001, Cohen d = 0.26). Double-spaced repetitions were superior to single-spaced repetitions for learning (62.24% vs 51.83%, P < .001, Cohen d = 0.43) and transfer (60.08% vs 55.72%, P < .001, Cohen d = 0.20). There were no meaningful differences in learning or transfer between repetition strategy chosen in the single- or double-repetition groups. This study affirms the value of spaced repetition in improving learning and retention in medical education and ongoing professional development.

Retrieval practice and word learning in children who are hard of hearing

Purpose Many children who are deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) show poorer auditory word-learning skills than children with typical hearing (TH). The goal of this study was to test the effect of retrieval practice on word learning in children who are hard of hearing (HH). Method Twenty-six TH children and 16 children who are HH completed a speech perception and a vocabulary test, and a rapid word-learning game to learn new words under no retrieval, immediate retrieval, and spaced retrieval conditions. Result Linear mixed-effect models revealed that learning condition and time predicted 48% of the variance in word recognition, and age predicted 15% of word recall variance. We observed no differences in word recognition and recall between TH children and children who are HH. Children learned and remembered more words in the immediate and spaced retrieval practice conditions than in the no retrieval condition. Conclusion Retrieval practice is more effective for word learning and retention than passive exposure (no retrieval). Clinical and educational practices for children who are DHH could combine explicit instruction using targeted exposures and retrieval of new words with naturalistic approaches. Future studies should assess retrieval practice in real-life interventions to inform clinical and educational practices.

Comparison between spaced retrieval and fading out techniques in teaching name-figure relations to older people with dementia

The people with Alzheimer's disease (AD) have difficulty in naming people and objects. Some errorless learning procedures are employed to retrieve this repertoire, but few studies compare different methods. This study aimed to compare the learning/recovery of picture naming performance by Spaced Retrieval (SR) and Fading Out (FO) procedures in older adults with AD. Participants were eight people with AD (seven women), aged between 65 and 90 years (median 84.5 years), with an average score of 14.5 on the Mini-Mental State Examination. Participants retrieved seven name-figure relations through the SR procedure and seven other relations through the FO procedure. Both procedures were equally effective in teaching relations to all participants, as verified in the naming and maintenance tests. However, in the FO condition, the average time for teaching each relation was approximately 50% shorter than in SR condition. In practical terms, the FO procedure was faster with fewer correction trials.

A Spaced Repetition Approach to Presenting Autonomic Nervous System Pharmacology Curricula in Medical Education

A Spaced Repetition Approach to Presenting Autonomic Nervous System Pharmacology Curricula in Medical Education

Anki flashcards: Spaced repetition learning in the undergraduate medical pharmacology curriculum.

Teaching clinical pharmacology is often a challenge for medical schools. The benefits and popularity of active recall and spaced repetition through Anki flashcards are well-established and can offer a solution for teaching complex topics, but educators are often unfamiliar with this resource. We implemented 501 faculty-generated pharmacology flashcards in five modules across the medical preclinical curriculum, available to 104 first-year students. At the end of each module, students were surveyed on the usefulness of this novel resource. The data from the cohort who had access to flashcards was compared with the previous cohort, without access, to analyse whether student use of Anki flashcards changed students' perceptions of the pharmacology curriculum and whether there were changes in pharmacology exam performance. Seventy-five percent of the respondents rated the Anki pharmacology flashcards as 'very useful' or 'somewhat useful'. Eight hundred and seventy-five responses were analysed with a natural language processing algorithm, showing that fewer students mentioned pharmacology as a difficult topic in the cardiovascular and renal modules, compared with the cohort who did not use Anki flashcards. There was not a statistically significant difference in test scores between the cohorts. Anki flashcards were well-received by medical students, which might have impacted their perception of the curriculum, as evidenced by the decrease in mentions of pharmacology being a difficult topic, maintaining consistency in academic performance. Educators should consider providing flashcards to offer spaced repetition opportunities in the curriculum; an additional benefit could be increasing information equality in medical schools.

Algorithmic Spaced Retrieval Enhances Long-Term Memory in Alzheimer Disease: Case-Control Pilot Study.

Spaced retrieval is a learning technique that involves engaging in repeated memory testing after increasingly lengthy intervals of time. Spaced retrieval has been shown to improve long-term memory in Alzheimer disease (AD), but it has historically been difficult to implement in the everyday lives of individuals with AD. This research aims to determine, in people with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) due to AD, the efficacy and feasibility of a mobile app that combines spaced retrieval with a machine learning algorithm to enhance memory retention. Specifically, the app prompts users to answer questions during brief daily sessions, and a machine learning algorithm tracks each user's rate of forgetting to determine the optimal spacing schedule to prevent anticipated forgetting. In this pilot study, 61 participants (young adults: n=21, 34%; healthy older adults: n=20, 33%; people with MCI due to AD: n=20, 33%) used the app for 4 weeks to learn new facts and relearn forgotten name-face associations. Participation during the 4-week period was characterized by using the app once per day to answer 15 questions about the facts and names. After the 4-week learning phase, participants completed 2 recognition memory tests approximately 1 week apart, which tested memory for information they had studied using the app as well as information they had not studied. After using the mobile app for 1 month, every person with MCI due to AD demonstrated improvements in memory for new facts that they had studied via the app compared to baseline (P<.001). All but one person with MCI due to AD (19/20, 95%) showed improvements of more than 10 percentage points, comparable to the improvements shown by young adults and healthy older adults. Memory for name-face associations was similarly improved for all participant groups after using the app but to a lesser degree. Furthermore, for both new facts and name-face associations, we found no memory decay for any participant group after they took a break of approximately 1 week from using the app at the end of the study. Regarding usability, of the 20 people with MCI due to AD, 16 (80%) self-adhered to the app's automated practice schedule, and half of them (n=10, 50%) expressed an interest in continuing to use it. These results demonstrate early evidence that spaced retrieval mobile apps are both feasible for people with early-stage AD to use in their everyday lives and effective for supporting memory retention of recently learned facts and name-face associations.

DRL-SRS: A Deep Reinforcement Learning Approach for Optimizing Spaced Repetition Scheduling

DRL-SRS: A Deep Reinforcement Learning Approach for Optimizing Spaced Repetition Scheduling

Effectiveness of spaced repetition for clinical problem solving amongst undergraduate medical students studying paediatrics in Pakistan

BackgroundStudies using spaced repetition for teaching and learning in undergraduate clinical rotations such as paediatrics are limited, even more so in the South Asian region. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the effectiveness of utilizing spaced repetition compared to traditional learning methods among undergraduate medical students during their paediatric rotation at a medical university in Pakistan.MethodsBahria University Medical and Dental College (BUMDC) conducted quasii-experimental research in Karachi. Four topics were identified from the Year 5 Pediatrics curriculum to be used in the study, using which the study content was developed along with 50 multiple choice questions (MCQs) for assessment. All BUMDC Year 5 medical students rotating in Pediatrics were included and randomly allocated to the control or intervention group. In the control group, they provided the students with traditional study methods consisting of books and lectures to learn topics. In the intervention group, we created an Anki flashcard deck of the same topics to enable learning via spaced repetition. The researchers conducted a pretest and post test assessment of the 50 MCQs in both groups at the beginning and after the four-week study interval. The data were analysed using SPSS 19.ResultsA total of 115 BUMDC medical students agreed to participate in the study; 70 (59.1%) were in the intervention group, and 45 (41.7%) were in the control group. The pretest mean score of the control group was 27.96 ± 3.70, and the posttest mean score was 27.22 ± 5.02, with no statistically significant difference at the 95% confidence level. The mean score of the pretest for the intervention group was 27.93 ± 4.53, and that of the posttest was 30.8 ± 4.56, with a statistically significant difference at the 95% confidence level. The intervention showed a significant effect size of 0.8.ConclusionThe use of spaced repetitions resulted in significantly greater scores for medical students studying paediatrics than for those using more traditional methods of learning, compromising medical books and lectures. Considering that medical students need to retain a vast amount of information, using spaced repetition through flashcards can be a more effective learning tool that is more cost-efficient and time-efficient than traditional learning methods.

Introducing Spaced Repetition Software (SRS) for vocabulary acquisition in a university-level Arabic language course: A case study

Spaced repetition (SR) is a proven memory technique, yet few L2 classrooms implement it for vocabulary acquisition and retention. This paper details a case study that introduced spaced repetition software (SRS) for L2 vocabulary acquisition in a university Arabic language course. The paper analyzes the results of a questionnaire about the effectiveness of SRS distributed to twenty-two beginning Arabic students at a major university who were required to use the method for vocabulary acquisition. A discussion of the theoretical benefits of SRS versus actual classroom results follows. The paper concludes with a reflection on various problems encountered, including student motivation, and makes recommendations for introducing SRS in the L2 classroom based on the experiment.

Training Finnish morphology with a smartphone application in adult beginner level learners

The rich inflectional grammar of Finnish is often considered a challenge for second language (L2) learners. However, the inflectional variation is based on relatively systematic morphological and morphophonological rules. Smartphone applications could offer an effective way to train these rules by utilizing adaptive spaced repetition exercises. Currently there is little research on morphology learning via Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL) applications in morphologically rich languages. The present study introduces a newly developed Finnish Morphology Application (FMA) that aims to teach beginner-level Finnish morphology. In a randomized controlled trial, the test group participants (n = 33) practiced Finnish morphology with the FMA during a three-week period, and their improvements were compared to those of an active control group using a general Finnish language learning application (n = 38). The practiced morphological operations comprised transparent and semi-transparent inflections. Pre- and posttests included a visual lexical decision task and a morphological production task. In comparison to the control group, the FMA group improved substantially in written morphological production skills, especially in transparent inflections. In visual lexical decision task, there was an improvement in accuracy for trained words in the FMA group, but this improvement applied to both transparent and semi-transparent inflections as well as monomorphemic nouns. In reaction times, there were no differences between the groups. Self-ratings of perceived efficacy of the FMA regarding grammar and vocabulary varied from neutral to positive. The results suggest that the FMA is particularly useful for learning inflectional production skills in Finnish by adult beginner level learners but can also be used to train word recognition.

Educational concepts: A longitudinal interleaved curriculum for emergency medicine residency training.

Traditionally, emergency medicine (EM) residency programs teach non-adult emergency department activities (such as pediatric EM, point-of-care ultrasound [PoCUS], emergency medical services, and others) in a block format. In this way, a resident may have a 1-month pediatric EM rotation and then not have any further pediatric EM exposure until their next pediatric rotation 6‒9 months later. Furthermore, some rotations are only allotted for 1-month during the entire residency. A first-year EM resident may have their only formal PoCUS rotation early in the first year of training when their overall skills are developing, and their level of understanding and retention of information may not be optimal at that juncture of their residency training. This is far from ideal from an educational perspective. Learning scientists have now suggested that a longitudinal interleaved curriculum has substantial advantages over the traditional block format. This curriculum allows for a "spaced retrieval" practice that enhances retention of material and develops thinking processes that are important in clinical practice. The increased continuity of clinical experience has been shown to improve educational outcome and learner satisfaction. We developed a novel longitudinal interleaved curriculum for our EM resident trainees. This curriculum encompasses the entire 3 years of residency training and has the goals of increasing EM knowledge and clinical skills and being excellent preparation for board certification examinations. This concept has clear educational benefits. While adapting an existing medical training program would be challenging, a longitudinal curriculum could be phased in to replace a traditional EM curriculum.

Energy storage peak-shaving demand prediction based on an improved neural network with hidden layers

Abstract The result shows that the BP neural network has a very low convergent speed for load prediction, which leads to local optimization. This paper presents a modified GA for the optimization of the threshold value, the initial weight, and the addition of the smoothing coefficient. In addition, it improves the BP neural network’s adaptive learning speed and further improves the efficiency of the search. The proposed model is characterized by high convergent speed and global space retrieval capability. To validate the validity of the modified GA-BP model, the prediction of power load in some regions is made. Compared with the BP neural network forecast algorithm, this method has better performance in terms of prediction accuracy and takes less time in terms of prediction time than the BP neural network. In parallel, the realization of multiple sources of electricity from wind, solar, and heat storage is an important way to deal with large-scale new grid connections. Starting from an improvement in the efficiency of wind and PV generation, it is also possible to build a joint optimization scheduling model for wind, solar, and heat storage. The purpose of taking the minimum net load fluctuation is for optimization. Taking the typical output day of user scenarios as the optimization scenario, the scheduling strategies of wind power, PV, thermal units, and energy storage systems are introduced and simulated on the platform. It is proved that the proposed model can decrease the reduction ratio and the peak and valley load.