In this experiment we investigated whether the presentation of domain principles within one text facilitates reading to learn from multiple exemplar texts that feature the importance of the principles. There were five texts about natural selection: a principles text, which described principles of natural selection, and four exemplar-based texts…

We propose a model delineating the role of control, value, and cognitive disequilibrium in elementary students' experience of emotions during mathematics problem solving. We tested this model across 2 studies. In Study 1, using an explanatory mixed-methods design, 136 students from Grades 3 to 6 worked on a complex mathematics problem appropriate…

Previous research has shown that explaining is an effective activity to enhance learning. In prior studies, students were instructed to explain the contents after completing an entire learning phase. Explaining at the end of a learning phase, however, may be less apt to support comprehension monitoring and subsequent regulation activities. In 2…

Misconceptions impair not only learners' comprehension of a text but also the accuracy with which they judge their comprehension, that is, "metacomprehension accuracy." Refutation texts are beneficial to elicit conceptual-change processes and thus to overcome the detrimental impact of misconceptions on comprehension. However, it is…

We developed an intervention based on the learning by teaching paradigm to foster self-regulatory processes and better learning outcomes during complex mathematics problem solving in a technology-rich learning environment. Seventy-eight elementary students were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 conditions: learning by preparing to teach, or learning for…

Reading comprehension is a critical component of success in educational settings. To date, research on text processing in educational and cognitive psychological domains has focused predominantly on cognitive influences on comprehension and, in particular, those influences that might be derived from particular tasks or strategies. However, there…

Classmates' academic skill level (peer effects) is emerging as an important predictor of individual student achievement, particularly in the early grades. However, less is known about the influence of peer effects with regard to classmates' self-regulation skills and whether they are associated with students' academic gains. Examining this is the…

Two experiments examined whether text quality is related to online management of the writing processes. Experiment 1 focused on the relationship between online management and text quality in narrative and argumentative texts. Experiment 2 investigated how this relationship might be affected by a goal emphasizing text quality. In both experiments,…

This study examines the impact of the Learning Strategies Curriculum (LSC), an adolescent reading intervention program, on 6th- and 9th-grade students' reading comprehension and strategy use. Using a randomized treatment-control group design, the study compared student outcomes for these constructs for 365 students who received daily instruction…

Examining self-reported verbal protocols and online measures of spelling latencies for 93 elementary school students showed that children seem to use a relatively sequential read-out from long-term memory when directly retrieving a spelling, but they use a consonant pair strategy for final consonant clusters when spelling out a word. (SLD)

College students (n=24) read passages marked for think-aloud (TA) procedure, not marked for TA, and control (no TA). The marked procedure elicited more veridical protocols, and students who scored high on the comprehension test were more likely to have made many TA comments reflecting a knowledge-transforming approach to the text. (SLD)

Strategy use and its impact on standardized reading test performance were studied with 128 high school students. Students in a standardized test condition used more strategies than those asked merely to identify main ideas. Thinking aloud had detrimental effects on ability to identify main ideas. (SLD)

The effects of an author, writing in the first person, on adolescents reading history textbooks were studied with six high school sophomores. Data from think-aloud protocols and semi-structured interviews show that students interacted with the "visible" author and engaged in mental conversations. (SLD)

This paper investigated the apparent failure of subjects to assess accurately their own reading comprehension. The results showed that readers who exhibited an illusion of knowing tended to have shown distortions in their passage summaries, whereas subjects who knew that they had failed to comprehend were more likely to have omitted information…

A study involving 32 undergraduate students was conducted to identify mechanisms by which instructional objectives affect learning. Protocols for thinking out loud were examined for evidence of rehearsal activity. Results suggest that instructional objectives enhanced real-time rehearsal activity, recall, and reading time. (TJH)