The comparative effectiveness of different types of instructors' notes provided during lectures of varying complexity was examined. Ninety-four undergraduates (sophomores and juniors) at a large Midwestern university were presented with 2 taped lectures, each about 60 minutes long. The first lecture was a fact-based description of instructional…

In studies examining the influence of recall on judgments, social psychologists have generally concentrated on the content of recalled material rather than on the process of recall. To investigate the impact of recalled behaviors (content) and the ease with which these behaviors came to mind (process) on assessment of one's own assertiveness, 158…

Controlling the rate of oral delivery in the second language classroom has been demonstrated as beneficial to the learner, whose information-processing capacity is an important factor in listening comprehension. Rate of information delivery can be controlled by limiting the actual rate of words per unit of time, or by maintaining content…

The Test for Inquiry Social Studies (TISS) is a 40-item multiple-choice instrument designed to measure the application of either inquiry social studies or higher-level cognitive thinking skills in fifth and sixth graders. The test can generally be completed in 40 to 50 minutes. This administrator's guide contains information on the reliability,…

In three experiments subjects (college and high school students) read passages which described psychological principles and answered either adjunct application or factual questions while reading. Questions were presented either before, after, or both before and after the parts of the passage that answered the questions. Subsequently subjects took…

Undergraduate students using an imagery mnemonic mediating technique involving "keywords" to learn definitions of thirty unfamiliar words performed better on a 1-week delayed comprehension test, on at least half of the definitions, than those who read and copied definitions. Mnemonic mediating strategies worked better than nonmediating strategies…

In this study comprehension of sentences describing two events occurring simultaneously or in sequence was assessed in 5-, 7- and 9-year-old children. The sentences were at three different levels of linguistic complexity, differing only in whether simultaneity or sequentiality was described. Subjects were kindergarten, second, and fourth grade…

Scores on the Role Construct Repertory Test exhibited significant correlations with other forms of cognitive functioning, including American College Test scores in science and mathematics for a group of 79 college students. The Grid Form of the test was used. Test-retest reliability was low. (Author/CTM)

Discusses cognitive processes readers engage in when comprehending instructional text and identifies familiar devices utilized by authors of instructional materials to support each of these processes. Included are appropriate vocabulary and sentence syntax use for intended audience; listing instructional objectives; and use of hierarchical…

The recall effectiveness of semantic and phonemic cues was compared to uncover the pattern of deep and elaborate processing in relation to age and experimental treatment. It was concluded that aging results in poor elaboration, especially in inefficient integration of word events with the context of presentation. (Author/CP)

Contextual facilitation appears to depend upon the mode of analysis of the prime. If the prime is analyzed as a meaningful unit, facilitation occurs. However, if it is subjected to a more discrete, letter-by-letter analysis, the priming effect vanishes. (Author/CP)

Confirmatory factor analysis of responses from 991 undergraduates showed that a four-factor structure (Affect, Cognitive Competence, Value, and Difficulty) provided the best fit for males and females as the factor structure of the Survey of Attitudes toward Statistics, developed for this study to measure students' attitudes about statistics. (SLD)

This study examined characteristics of multiple-choice reading comprehension tasks suspected of influencing their difficulty, through administration of the California Achievement Tests to 158 deaf college students. Problem components evaluated included manifest content, psychologically salient features, and processing demands. Variation in item…