The intricate relationship between representational competence and content knowledge in organic chemistry has been widely debated, and the ways in which representations contribute to task difficulty, particularly in assessment, remain unclear. This paper presents a multiple-choice test instrument for assessing individuals' knowledge of fundamental…

Prior research has emphasized that two-tier tests are an effective approach to guiding students through game tasks; furthermore, self-efficacy, which is potentially related to students' surroundings and academic performance, has a positive impact on students' cognitive outcomes in games. This implies the significance of conducting a study to probe…

Three-dimensional (3D) digital anatomical models show potential to demonstrate complex anatomical relationships; however, the literature is inconsistent as to whether they are effective in improving the anatomy performance, particularly for students with low spatial visualization ability (Vz). This study investigated the educational effectiveness…

The development and evaluation of valid assessments of scientific reasoning are an integral part of research in science education. In the present study, we used the linear logistic test model (LLTM) to analyze how item features related to text complexity and the presence of visual representations influence the overall item difficulty of an…

Distractors might display discriminatory power with respect to the construct of interest (e.g., intelligence), which was shown in recent applications of nested logit models to the short-form of Raven's progressive matrices and other reasoning tests. In this vein, a simulation study was carried out to examine two effect size measures (i.e., a…

In the current study, we aimed to develop a reliable and valid scale to address individual cognitive load types. Existing scale development studies involved limited number of items without adequate convergent, discriminant and criterion validity checks. Through a multistep correlational study, we proposed a three-factor scale with 13 items to…

This research combines work in memory, retrieval practice, and depth of processing research. This work aims to identify how the format and depth of a retrieval practice item can be manipulated to increase the effort required to successfully recall or formulate an answer, with the hypothesis that if the effort required to answer an item is…

Classroom practices, materials and teaching methods in language classes have changed a lot in the last decades and continue to evolve; however, the commonly used techniques to test students' foreign language skills have not changed much regardless of the recent awareness in Bloom's taxonomy. Testing units at schools rely mostly on multiple choice…

Across education, certification and licensure, there are repeated calls for the development of assessments that target "higher-order thinking," as opposed to mere recall of facts. A common assumption is that this necessitates the use of constructed response or essay-style test questions; however, empirical evidence suggests that this may…

In general, researchers attempt to quantify cognitive load using physiologic and psychometric measures. Although the construct measured by both of these metrics is thought to represent overall cognitive load, there is a paucity of studies that compares these techniques to one another. The authors compared data obtained from one physiologic tool…

Our study examined whether brief writing-to-learn assignments linked to lower and higher levels in Bloom's taxonomy affected performance differentially on examination performance in assessing these skill levels. Using a quasi-random design, 91 undergraduate students in an introductory psychology class completed eight lower level and eight higher…

To optimize learning in lectures, students need to maintain a sustained level of attention to the lecture material. Previous research has suggested, however, that student attention declines over the course of the lecture. One strategy suggested to improve sustained attention of students during the lecture is to encourage note-taking by students.…

This study evaluates a 12-item instrument for subjective measurement of mental load (ML) and mental effort (ME) by analysing different sources of validity evidence. The findings of an expert judgement (N = 8) provide "evidence based on test content" that the formulation of the items corresponds to the meaning of ML and ME. An empirical…

According to cognitive load theorists, the incorporation of extraneous features, such as pedagogical agents, into the learning environment can introduce extraneous cognitive load and thus interfere with learning outcome scores. In this study, the influence of a pedagogical agent's presence in an instructional video was compared to a video that did…

This study aimed at exploring the impact of mentor text modelling on Iranian English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners' accuracy and fluency in writing tasks with different cognitive complexity in comparison with two conventional approaches to teaching writing; namely, process-based and product-based approaches. To this end, 60 Iranian EFL…