Linda Annis

The Effect of Encoding and an External Memory Device on Note Taking.

College students were randomly assigned to seven note-taking and review conditions in order to determine the relative importance of the functions of encoding and either an externally provided or a personally produced memory device. Results of the post-test showed that a combination of encoding and reviewing either one’s own notes or an outline of the lecture produced the best recall scores, while either personally encoding notes or being provided with a lecture outline during the lecture accompanied by “mental” review produced the least recall. The findings are discussed in terms of practical suggestions for professors and their students.

Effect of Preference for Assigned Lecture Notes on Student Achievement.

AbstractCollege students were assigned to either take their own personal notes or to use full or partial notes that had been distributed to them while listening to a lecture in order to determine the effect of using a preferred or nonpreferred lecture note method on multiple- choice and essay test scores and on post-lecture note preference. The use of personal or partial notes resulted in higher scores on the essay test and students preferring personal or partial notes scored better on the multiple-choice exam suggesting the importance of personally encoding notes. Partial notes preference was most popular both before and after the lecture.

Study Techniques and Cognitive Style: Their Effect on Recall and Recognition

AbstractField-independent and field-dependent college students studied a 1525-word article under a preferred or non preferred study condition (read only, underline, or note taking). Half of the subjects reviewed the material prior to an examination and half did not. Results indicated that both field-independent and field-dependent subjects generally produced the best recognition scores when they used a non preferred study technique and reviewed. Both note takers and underliners produced significantly better recall scores than readers only. Implications for further research are discussed.

Student-Generated Paragraph Summaries and the Information-Processing Theory of Prose Learning

AbstractStudent-generated paragraph summaries require students to pause after reading each paragraph of text in order to write a sentence or less summary in their own words. Paragraph summaries appear to meet the demands of the information-processing theory of learning. This study investigated the effectiveness of reading only, regular note taking, and paragraph summaries for questions at the six levels of Bloom’s taxonomy. Paragraph summaries were most effective at the application and analysis levels and least effective at the synthesis and evaluation levels. These results suggest that paragraph summaries may be most useful in encouraging the essential encoding process.

The Effect of Study Techniques, Study Preferences, and Familiarity on Later Recall.

College students were assigned to various study and review conditions in order to determine the effect of using a preferred or non-preferred study technique and of being familiar or unfamiliar with an assigned reading topic. When an individual preferred reading as a study technique and was familiar with the topic, reading produced the best performance on the posttest. The least effective performance was produced by reading when a person preferred to read but was unfamiliar with the topic. The findings are discussed in terms of their practical implications for students and their instructors.

A normative study of students’ reported preferred study techniques

Abstract There is no data in the literature regarding the study techniques actually used by students in various grades. The absence of this data may in part explain the conflicting results in the literature on study technique effectiveness. This normative study investigated the study technique preferences of 914 students in grades 6–8, 10–12, and at the college level in order to determine the study techniques actually used by students at various ages. The results indicate that with increasing grade level there is an increase in the total number of study techniques described by students, and also that with increasing grade level Read Only decreases in popularity and is replaced by the study techniques of Underlining and/or Note Taking. Possible explanations for these results include the more active involvement and encoding required by Underlining and Note Taking and the increasing influence of individual differences.

The Impact of Philosophy on Students' Critical Thinking Ability.

Abstract College students enrolled in various kinds of philosophy courses and in a nonphilosophy control group were tested at the beginning and end of the term with different forms of the Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal in order to determine the effect of course content on growth in critical thinking. It was found that Logic had a consistent impact on certain aspects of critical thinking, while other philosophy courses when compared to the control group did not have this consistent effect. It was also found that student sex interacts with number of previous philosophy courses for at least one aspect of critical thinking, with females scoring lower than males when both have no previous courses in philosophy and higher than males when both sexes have had previous philosophy courses. Implications of these findings for increasing the growth of critical thinking in other disciplines are discussed.