Browsing by Author "Pirozzolo, Joseph W."
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Item Spaced Versus Massed Testing in a College Class: An Explanatory Item Response Model(2016-05) Pirozzolo, Joseph W.; Francis, David J.; Foss, Donald J.; Steinberg, Lynne; Tolar, TammyMany studies have shown that distributed study is more effective than massed study. In the present study we were interested in the effects of frequent testing, student ability, practice quizzing, and item form (multiple choice or short-answer) at the pre-tests and the post-test. Two sections of an undergraduate psychological methods class were taught by the same professor at similar times of day. In the frequent testing class, 8 midterm exams were spaced about 1 exam every 2 weeks. In the standard class, 2 midterm exams were spaced about 1 every 8 weeks. All exams, including the final exam, consisted of both multiple choice (MC) and short answer (SA) questions. The form of questions (MC or SA) during the midterm exams was called the pre-test method and the form on the final was called the post-test method. Both classes took the same comprehensive final exam. Only final exam data was analyzed in this study. An explanatory item response model (EIRM) was used to estimate the effects of the person predictors: student ability, testing frequency, and quiz assignment, and the item predictors: pre-test and post-test method on final exam performance. Not surprisingly, student ability and post-test method explained the most variance in item responses of any of the predictors in the model. Testing frequency also significantly influenced item responses. A marginally significant interaction between testing frequency and post-test method was also observed. We conclude that frequent testing (spacing) improves performance relative to massing, however, the largest benefits are expected to be seen on recall memory tasks. We also argue that the benefits of frequent testing generalize across populations and conditions.Item The Testing Effect, Individual Differences, and Transfer: An Investigation of Learning Strategies Using Educational Materials(2019-05) Pirozzolo, Joseph W.; Foss, Donald J.; Francis, David J.; Grigorenko, Elena L.; Hernandez, Arturo E.; Hein, Sascha D.The positive effect of testing memory has been well demonstrated in laboratory settings and there is now a growing body of supporting evidence in real educational environments. However, whether and under what conditions testing facilitates transfer of learning is still somewhat unclear. Individual differences in learning from tests have also not been extensively studied. The aim of the current study is to further investigate the limits of transfer of learning via testing and explore the role of key cognitive abilities (i.e., reading comprehension, reasoning ability, and working memory). To accomplish this goal, we use an instance in the subject of Biology where we believe that background knowledge (i.e., the components of nucleic acids) is necessary for understanding of a subsequent related concept (i.e., DNA transcription). In a within-subjects experimental design with data from 153 undergraduate students, we examined the effect of testing over background knowledge on performance on subsequent related information. Our study provides evidence of the positive effect of testing on not only exactly repeated test items (d= 1.01), but conceptually related questions (near transfer; d = .60) and questions about a subsequent related passage (far transfer; d = .21). We also report that testing influences pre-test score predictions, such that repeated testing is associated with increased pre-test confidence, while varied testing is not. Finally, we report that individual differences in cognitive ability do not interact with testing effects, but transfer performance is correlated with reasoning ability. Overall, we conclude that retrieval practice with cued recall questions is a highly effective strategy for learning complex educational materials.