In a recent study in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, Roediger, Agarwal, McDaniel and McDermott1 provide additional evidence for test-enhanced learning as a way to improve memory. It echoes an earlier study of Roediger’s in which he found in a controlled laboratory experiment that students randomly assigned to take a test had greater long-term retention than students randomly assigned to study the material. In this new research, Roediger and colleagues replicate this finding in 3 quasi-experimental field studies.
- Experiment 1: Students were quizzed on the material. They then completed later items on an exam with items parallel to the quiz items. Both chapter exam and semester exam scores of those completing quizzes were higher. Students from multiple course sections participated, and different sections received different pre-test questions; the effect held only for those questions presented int the pre-test.
- Experiment 2: Students were quizzes on the material. They then completed later items on an exam with both parallel and identical items to the quiz items. Again, exam scores were higher. The design in this experiment was similar, except for the addition of a control condition. Recall on the control was similar to that of the non-pre-tested items, lending additional support to the effect.
- Experiment 3: Students were given a multiple choice quiz in class and encouraged to continue quizzing themselves at home using a web-based tool. Students using the quizzing tool had higher exam scores on items from the quiz.
The third of these is the iffy-ist – the increased test scores could reflect higher-quality students rather than higher-quality studying, and it’s not clear to what extent the first testing effort or the home testing elicited the effect. But the general approach did seem to work for at least some of them.
Test-enhanced learning is potentially valuable in several ways. First, it is a potential application of gamification, which I covered last week. By motivating students to complete optional quizzes using badges and other motivational game-derived elements, students may learn more (and enjoy it!). Second, it is a potential pedagogical tool in both education and employee training. For example, a mid-training 5-minute practice test may increase retention more than simply asking people to review their notes for 5 minutes.
But here’s the big question for me as an educator – does this mean that adding regular quizzes to a course will increase scores on the final exam, even if the quiz questions don’t appear on the final? And perhaps more importantly, does that mean that students actually learned more, or is it because you focused their attention on the topics you knew you’d be testing on? Future research is clearly warranted.
- Roediger, H., Agarwal, P., McDaniel, M., & McDermott, K. (2011). Test-enhanced learning in the classroom: Long-term improvements from quizzing. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 17 (4), 382-395 DOI: 10.1037/a0026252 [↩]
In a recent study by Landers and Callan1, undergraduates completed optional multiple-choice tests online and reported them, on average, as “fun”, “enjoyable”, and “rewarding”. They did this in the context of an online social network platform previously covered on this blog. Students were awarded badges (social rewards) in exchange for completing optional practice tests theorized to improve their learning.
This is, to my knowledge, the first published empirical study of gamification in educational settings.
Landers and Callan posit that gamification can be best expressed as an extension of goal setting theory. By making explicit goals and recognizing their achievement, we can motivate people to action. Gamification, in this sense, is the recognition of goals electronically and automatically, without the need for a human mediator (most often an instructor in an educational context or a supervisor in an organizational context). This makes the reward for goal achievement more immediate than is possible with traditional methods and thus more motivating. Goal setting is well established as a motivational intervention in a wide variety of contexts, so we would expect gamification to be similarly versatile – and perhaps even more powerful.
What’s especially interesting about this study (if I do say so myself) is that the authors managed to make the completion of optional multiple choice tests a valid student goal. Most of the time, grades on tests are themselves a performance goal for students. But if you ask them to complete practice tests on their own time, you are often met with varying levels of resistance – or simple apathy. With gamification, about 30% of students enrolled in the social network platform opted to take these tests for no reward other than a virtual badge. I expect you’d see similar success with an organizational training intervention (upcoming research!).
So why should we get students to complete optional multiple choice tests? Because other research suggests that the act of testing promotes long term retention of knowledge better than studying does. Not only do they get a badge, but they learn material for their courses more effectively than they could do on their own! I consider that a win-win.
- Landers, R. N., & Callan, R. C. (2011). Casual social games as serious games: The psychology of gamification in undergraduate education and employee training. In M. Ma, A. Oikonomou, & L. C. Jain (Eds.), Serious Games and Edutainment Applications (pp. 399-423). Surrey, UK: Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4471-2161-9_20 [↩]
You might have noticed that I missed last week. Well, that’s because it’s the holiday season, which for academics means intense sessions of writing to make up for all the not-writing during the Fall semester! I’ll be returning to my regularly weekly coverage of technology, education, and psychological scholarly articles in January.
In the meantime, I wanted to assure everyone that I was in fact coming back, as well as wish everyone a happy, safe, and productive holiday season!