Influence of response mode, sex, reading ability, and level of difficulty on four measures of recall of meaningful written material.

Abstract

Research into the effects of overt versus covert responding in a learning situation has produced contradictory results. The present study was undertaken to clarify some of these findings. Three response modes were compared across three levels of difficulty for men and women with high and low reading ability-a total of 180 college students classified in 36 groups. Comparisons were made on four dependent measures of recall. Consistent differences were found as a function of reading ability; sex was also shown to have significant effects. Few differences were found for difficulty level or response mode. The results demonstrated that (a) reading ability must be controlled in studies of learning involving meaningful verbal material; (b) an unknown sex factor influences learning or recall of meaningful material; (c) the recall of ideas from meaningful material is influenced by the amount of material; (d) the facilitating influence of overt responding is limited by the independent and dependent variables involved in the learning or performance situation.

Vocalization, Primary Memory and Secondary Memory

“…Since vocalization involves an auditory component, we compared vocalized presentation, not only with silent presentation, but also with aural presentation, and with a mixed-mode condition in which the subjects heard the story at the same time as they silently read it. It may be noted here that Todd & Kessler (1971) found relatively little effect of the mode of presentation upon the retention of this particular story. In addition to the variable of presentation mode in the present experiment, recall was given after either 5 min.…”

“…The subjects were 80 students from introductory psychology classes at Queen's University. There were an equal number of males and females in each group, as Todd & Kessler (1971) found females to be superior t o males in the recall of this story. Table 1 shows the percentage of units recalled by each of the eight groups.…”

Mathemagenic Behaviours and Efficiency in Learning from Prose Materials: Review, Critique and Recommendations

“…Idstein and Jenkins (1972), using two very different passages and a delayed completion test, found that underlining was not significantly better than rereading for either of the passages. Todd and Kessler (1971) used very brief passages and compared recall as measured by words, word sequences, or ideas for three response modes. Significant differences were found in the word sequence measure where underlining was best and note-taking was worst.…”

Underlining Can Make a Difference—Sometimes

“…Nearly all of the studies use multiple-choice questions, constructed response items, or both as their method of assessing recall. Only two studies used free recall (26,32). It might well be that the failure to find significant differences results from the insensitivity of the measures used.…”