Learning from refutation texts about scientific topics with analogical and causal explanations

Previous research has suggested that refutation texts are effective in facilitating learning and revision of misconceptions and that explanations are an essential component in their efficacy. In this study, we investigated the extent to which reading refutation texts featuring an analogy as an explanatory tool rather than a causal explanation results in different encoding processes during reading, belief in misconceptions, and confidence in beliefs. Using a think-aloud methodology, we found that a higher proportion of text-based inferences was associated with analogy texts than with non-analogy texts, and a higher proportion of knowledge-based inferences was associated with non-analogy than with analogy texts. Contrary to our hypotheses, no significant differences were found in belief in misconceptions and confidence outcomes between the text conditions. We discuss the implications of these findings in light of previous research suggesting that analogies improve learning outcomes.     

Learning from texts: activation of information from previous texts during reading

Learning often involves integration of information from multiple texts. The aim of the current study was to determine whether relevant information from previously read texts is spontaneously activated during reading, allowing for integration between texts (experiment 1 and 2), and whether this process is related to the representation of the texts (experiment 2). In both experiments, texts with inconsistent target sentences were preceded by texts that either did or did not contain explanations that resolved the inconsistencies. In experiment 1, the reading times of the target sentences introducing inconsistencies were faster if the preceding text contained an explanation for the inconsistency than if it did not. This result demonstrates that relevant information from a prior text is spontaneously activated when the target sentence is read. In experiment 2 free recall was used to gain insight into the representation after reading. The reading time results for experiment 2 replicated the reading time results for experiment 1. However, the effects on reading times did not translate to measurable differences in text representations after reading. This research extends our knowledge about the processes involved in multiple text comprehension: Prior text information is spontaneously activated during reading, thereby enabling integration between different texts.     

Detection of explanation obstacles in scientific texts: the effect of an understanding task vs. an experiment task

The aim of this study is to analyse the effect of tasks on the detection of explanation obstacles when secondary school students read scientific texts. Students were instructed to read short passages under different task conditions, and to ask questions if necessary. Obstacle detection was operationalised in terms of the type of questions asked by the students. The experiment examined the influence of goals associated with the task of reading to understand a text vs. reading to perform a procedure described by the text (a science experiment). Significantly, more explanation obstacles were found in the understanding condition than in the experiment condition. Scientific text also had an effect on the explanation obstacles detected.     

Learning from expository texts: Effects of the interaction of prior knowledge and text structure on responses to different question types

The objective of this study was to verify the effects of the interaction between text structures and prior knowledge on memory and learning from expository texts. It examined the effects of two levels of prior knowledge and two types of mixed structures on a post-reading questionnaire. A total of 119 French-speaking, sixth-grade subjects were selected on the basis of a multiple-choice questionnaire. This questionnaire served to distinguish two groups, one possessing a high level of prior knowledge about the topic covered in the text (HP group), and another having a low level of prior knowledge (LP group). The children’s reading ability was evaluated by a cloze test that also served to eliminate children with reading comprehension difficulties from the experimental groups. The subjects in each group were arbitrarily assigned to subgroups. One group read an experimental passage, “The effects of acid rain on maple and pine”, which was organized in a collection inserted in cause/effect structure (SI). The other group read the same information, but which was organized in a comparison inserted in cause/effect structure (S2). The post-reading measure consisted of 24 questions that varied according to three criteria. The statistical analysis revealed that the effects of text structure were dependent on the level of prior knowledge and on the type of questions and confirmed that prior knowledge had a determining influence on knowledge acquisition.     

Learning from text: knowing the test format enhanced metacognitive monitoring

In an experiment with 56 young adults, the hypothesis was tested that information about the format of an anticipated test improves metacognitive monitoring. Half of the participants were informed about the format of the test before they started studying a text about human genetics. The other half of the sample received the same information after studying the text. All participants then answered 15 true-false inference items about the contents of the text and judged their confidence in the correctness of each answer. Whereas experimental and control group did not differ in the number of correct answers, the confidence judgments in the experimental group were more accurate and discriminated better between correct and incorrect answers than the control participants’ judgments. Furthermore, the informed participants’ discrimination performance correlated positively with their domain-related prior knowledge. The results extend earlier findings concerning the role of the test format for monitoring processes.     

Exploring the effect of background knowledge and text cohesion on learning from texts in computer science

In this study, we examine the effect of background knowledge and local cohesion on learning from texts. The study is based on construction–integration model. Participants were 176 undergraduate students who read a Computer Science text. Half of the participants read a text of maximum local cohesion and the other a text of minimum local cohesion. Afterwards, they answered open-ended and multiple-choice versions of text-based, bridging-inference and elaborative-inference questions. The results showed that students with high background knowledge, reading the low-cohesion text, performed better in bridging-inference and in elaborative-inference questions, than those who read the high-cohesion text. Students with low background knowledge, reading the high-cohesion text, performed better in all types of questions than students reading the low-cohesion text only in elaborative-inference questions. The performance with open-ended and multiple-choice questions was similar, indicating that this type of question is more difficult to answer, regardless of the question format.     

Learning from error and the design of task environments

Errors constitute a major source of information for the learner while practising an unfamiliar task The main principles of the proposed theory of learning from error are that (1) actions are always the result of (possibly implicit) choices among relevant options, (2) initial task knowledge is overly general, (3) errors occur because incorrectly activated options displace the correct ones, (4) the detection of errors requires task-specific knowledge, (5) error correction requires blame assignment, and (6) erroneous task knowledge is corrected through specialization. Two realistic errors are analyzed in detail, one from a symbolic task in chemistry and one from a concrete household task. Four implications for the design of training and performance environments are derived from the theory. Differences and similarities to a leading alternative theory are discussed.     

Learning chemistry from text: The effect of decision making

Two experiments examined the relative effects of questions requiring decisions, statements providing the decision information to students, questions not requiring decisions, and control procedures on students' memory for chemistry text reading materials. Experiment 1 employed immediate recall. The results of Experiment 1 indicated that students who made and justified decisions about the contents recalled significantly more information than students in any other condition. In addition, students who answered questions that did not require decisions recalled significantly more of the content than students in the control or the statements conditions. No other contrasts reached significance. Experiment 2 employed delayed recall assessed one week after reading. The results confirmed those of Experiment 1. The overall results of the study are discussed in terms of an elaboration perspective on memory.     

Learning from physics text: A synthesis of recent research

Learning from physics text is described as a complex interaction of learner, text, and context variables. As a multidimensional procedure, text processing in the domain of physics relies on readers' knowledge and interest, and on readers' ability to monitor or regulate their processing. Certain textual features intended to assist readers in understanding and remembering physics content may actually work to the detriment of those very processes. Inclusion of seductive details and the incorporation of analogies may misdirect readers' attention or may increase processing demands, particularly in those cases when readers' physics knowledge is low. The questioning behaviors of teachers also impact on the task of comprehending physics texts. Finally, within the context of the classroom, the information that teachers dispense or the materials they employ can significantly influence the process of learning from physics text.     

Reading Arabic texts: Effects of text type,reader type and vowelization

While much is known about Latin orthography little is known about Arabic orthography. This study investigates the effect of vowels on reading accuracy in Arabic orthography. Participants were 64 native Arabic speakers. Four kinds of written Arabic texts were administered: narrative, informative, poetic and Koranic. Three texts of each kind were presented in three reading conditions: correctly vowelized, unvowelized and wrongly vowelized. Results indicated that vowels had a significant effect on reading accuracy of poor and skilled readers in reading each of the four kinds of texts. The results are discussed in light of the concept that more cross-cultural considerations should be made in reading theory today.     

Comprehending coherent and incoherent texts: evidence from eye movement patterns and recall performance

The effect of text structure on the reading process and recall performance was examined. Adult readers’ eye movements were monitored when they read coherently and incoherently structured texts (N=19). Incoherence was brought about by changing the sentence order in the middle paragraphs of the two stimulus texts. Each subject read and learned one text in a coherent and the other in an incoherent form in two experimental sessions. Immediate free recall followed the reading. The eye movement data showed that during the first pass reading, i.e. initial reading of a sentence until the end of the sentence is reached, structurally incoherent text segments attracted the largest number of regressive fixations, and, hence, were given more visual attention than coherent text segments (indicated by the total duration of fixations). On the other hand, more rereadings, i.e. all fixations made after the first pass reading but before moving away from the given sentence, were devoted to text segments resolving the incoherence. Textual incoherence was further found to lead to inferior recall. However, no clear-cut correspondence between eye movement behavior and quantitative recall performance was found.     

Learning from text and video blogs: comprehension effects on secondary school students

Education and Information Technologies - Informational video blogs are a popular method of communication among students that may be fruitful educational tools, but their potential benefits and...     

Role of generated and provided visuals in supporting learning from scientific text

This study explored the role of learner-generated and instructor-provided visuals in learning from scientific text. 134 college students studied a lesson on the human circulatory system and then completed recall and transfer tests. Across two consecutive study periods, students were randomly assigned to either view a provided illustration twice (provided-provided), generate a drawing from the text and then revise their drawing (generated-revised), view a provided illustration and then generate a drawing (provided-generated), or generate a drawing and then view a provided illustration (generated-provided). Results indicated a group by learning outcome interaction: the generated-provided and provided-generated groups performed higher on the transfer test and lower on the recall test compared to the provided-provided group. Furthermore, spatial ability was positively associated with learning outcomes among students who generated drawings but not among students in the provided-provided group. Finally, the relationship between spatial ability and learning outcomes among students who generated drawings was mediated by drawing quality. These findings suggest that provided and generated visuals have unique effects on different learning outcomes, and spatial ability plays an important role in supporting learner-generated visuals.     

Drawing pictures during learning from scientific text: testing the generative drawing effect and the prognostic drawing effect

Does using a learner-generated drawing strategy (i.e., drawing pictures during reading) foster students' engagement in generative learning during reading? In two experiments, 8th-grade students (Exp. 1: N = 48; Exp. 2: N = 164) read a scientific text explaining the biological process of influenza and then took two learning outcome tests. In Experiment 1, students who were asked to draw pictures during reading (learner-generated drawing group), scored higher than students who only read (control group) on a multiple-choice comprehension test (d = 0.85) and on a drawing test (d = 1.15). In Experiment 2, students in the learner-generated drawing group scored significantly higher than the control group on both a multiple-choice comprehension test (d = 0.52) and on a drawing test (d = 1.89), but students who received author-generated pictures in addition to drawing or author-generated pictures only did not. Additionally, the drawing-accuracy scores during reading correlated with comprehension test scores (r = .623, r = .470) and drawing scores (r = .620, r = .615) in each experiment, respectively. These results provide further evidence for the generative drawing effect and the prognostic drawing effect, thereby confirming the benefits of the learner-generated drawing strategy.     

Refutation texts: Implying the refutation of a scientific misconception can facilitate knowledge revision

Refutation texts facilitate knowledge revision by placing science misconceptions in the foreground. However, in some situations, repeating incorrect information can work against the desired goal of correcting misconceptions, or can spread misinformation to new audiences. Thus, our goal was to examine whether merely implying the existence of a misconception, without explicitly stating the incorrect information, is sufficient to facilitate knowledge revision from a text. Undergraduate participants who expressed a common physics misconception read one of three passages about the issue, including a correct explanation of the situation. The passages differed in whether the refutation of the misconception was explicitly stated, implied by a warning phrase, or not referred to at all. We found that participants were less likely to express the misconception when they were questioned about the topic after reading the passage with the explicit refutation or with the warning phrase. Furthermore, the current results indicate that refutations of misconceptions can influence knowledge revision in ways that extended beyond the details of the original learning episode, even when they are only implied by a warning phrase. However, it remains unclear whether implied refutations of misconceptions can endure across a delay in time. These findings have potential implications for optimizing science texts to effectively address misconceptions.     

Reading multiple texts about climate change: The relationship between memory for sources and text comprehension

In many situations, readers are asked to learn from multiple documents. Many studies have found that evaluating the trustworthiness and usefulness of document sources is an important skill in such learning situations. There has been, however, no direct evidence that attending to source information helps readers learn from and interpret a document's content. In this study we examined whether students' awareness of sources predicts their comprehension of documents, controlling for prior knowledge, interest and perceived comprehensibility of the texts. Participants read multiple texts that provided different perspectives on the causes and solutions of climate change. Deep comprehension was measured using both within-text and across-text inference verification tests. Source awareness was measured using a test of memory for sources. We found that memory for sources predicted both types of deep comprehension. These results, in combination with source training studies, suggest that improving students' sourcing skills may benefit their learning of text content.     

Prior knowledge,reading skill,and text cohesion in the comprehension of science texts

This study examined how text features (i.e., cohesion) and individual differences (i.e., reading skill and prior knowledge) contribute to biology text comprehension. College students with low and high levels of biology knowledge read two biology texts, one of which was high in cohesion and the other low in cohesion. The two groups were similar in reading skill. Participants' text comprehension was assessed with open-ended comprehension questions that measure different levels of comprehension (i.e., text-based, local-bridging, global-bridging). Results indicated: (a) reading a high-cohesion text improved text-based comprehension; (b) overall comprehension was positively correlated with participants' prior knowledge, and (c) the degree to which participants benefited from reading a high-cohesion text depended on participants' reading skill, such that skilled participants gained more from high-cohesion text.     

Eye-movement patterns and reader characteristics of students with good and poor performance when reading scientific text with diagrams

This study investigated the cognitive processes and reader characteristics of sixth graders who had good and poor performance when reading scientific text with diagrams. We first measured the reading ability and reading self-efficacy of sixth-grade participants, and then recorded their eye movements while they were reading an illustrated scientific text and scored their answers to content-related questions. Finally, the participants evaluated the difficulty of the article, the attractiveness of the content and diagram, and their learning performance. The participants were then classified into groups based on how many correct responses they gave to questions related to reading. The results showed that readers with good performance had better character recognition ability and reading self-efficacy, were more attracted to the diagrams, and had higher self-evaluated learning levels than the readers with poor performance did. Eye-movement data indicated that readers with good performance spent significantly more reading time on the whole article, the text section, and the diagram section than the readers with poor performance did. Interestingly, readers with good performance had significantly longer mean fixation duration on the diagrams than readers with poor performance did; further, readers with good performance made more saccades between the text and the diagrams. Additionally, sequential analysis of eye movements showed that readers with good performance preferred to observe the diagram rather than the text after reading the title, but this tendency was not present in readers with poor performance. In sum, using eye-tracking technology and several reading tests and questionnaires, we found that various cognitive aspects (reading strategy, diagram utilization) and affective aspects (reading self-efficacy, article likeness, diagram attraction, and self-evaluation of learning) affected sixth graders’ reading performance in this study.