The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of gamified training in cybersecurity concepts on individuals not employed in information technology roles compared to traditional pieces of training. As the world becomes increasingly connected technologically, so too do the cyber vulnerabilities increase, and it is essential for all types of…

While visual working memory has a short lifetime, residual representations can persist and disrupt currently maintained information. This phenomenon is known as proactive interference (PI), and the present study investigated whether the representations underpinning item-specific PI lose details over time. This would be expected if the memories…

Educators must continuously assess and adjust to maximize the amount of information students retain. One way to evaluate teaching effectiveness is thru pre- and post-semester assessments. Factors such as individual willingness to participate can affect the validity of these assessments. Our hypothesis was that students will more actively…

Numerous studies have shown that learned information practiced by testing is better retained than that practiced by restudying (the testing effect). However, results are inconsistent regarding the effect of working memory (WM) capacity on the testing effect. Here, we hypothesize that the effect of WM only emerges when task demands challenge WM…

The present work was conducted to re-examine the findings of Agarwal et al. ("Applied Cognitive Psychology," 22(7), 861-876, 2008), which showed that both closed-book tests (with feedback) and open-book tests increased learning outcomes after 1 week compared to simple re-study of the same materials. However, contrary to often found…

The purpose of the experiment was to investigate whether using the summarizing strategy can further engage learners in a computer-based environment where different forms of finger tracing were incorporated. One hundred and fifty-six university students were randomly assigned to one of six conditions formed by a 3 (hand tracing vs. observing…

Spaced retrieval practice consists of repetitions of the same retrieval event distributed through time. This learning strategy combines two "desirable difficulties": retrieval practice and spacing effects. We carried out meta-analyses on 29 studies investigating the benefit of spacing out retrieval practice episodes on final retention.…

Evidence-based practice in education is the implementation of research-supported teaching tools to enhance students' learning. Retrieval practice is among the top performing learning techniques in scientific literature, with decades of research supporting its incorporation in educational contexts. Testing enhances posterior performance of the…

The educational communities have come of age to reinvigorate instructional techniques, approaches and packages through augmentation of the existing traditional methods. The development of such new pedagogical and andragogical methods have recently paved way for the inclusion and use of technologies in education. In an attempt to establish…

Postsecondary science faculty face challenges in balancing the engagement of undergraduates and concomitantly ensuring they gain and retain knowledge, either in standard lectures or labs as well as in outdoor activities. Designing on-campus trails with interpretive signs may provide a unique avenue to inform students across majors of local…

Word learning depends on attention -- children must focus on the right things at the right times. However, autistic children often display restricted interests, limiting their intake of stimuli during word learning. This study investigates how category interests influence word learning in autism and neurotypical development. Autistic and…

Employment of appropriate study strategies is crucial for academic success. Previous findings on whether use of specific strategies is related to academic performance in real educational settings were inconsistent, and their participant samples were largely restricted to undergraduate students. The current study recruited a large sample (i.e.,…

Successful adoption of proven effective practice strategies such as distributed practice may contribute to much-needed improvement in mathematics performance. However, it is not yet fully understood if distributed practice is beneficial for long-term retention of complex procedural knowledge and, if so, for which initial practice performance level…

Background and purpose of the study: STEM learning often involves a multitude of complex and abstract concepts and ideas that can be challenging for students to comprehend. Research suggests that the oral and visual representations in video lectures can maximize students' cognitive infrastructure, helping them to organize knowledge more…

The empirical evidence concerning the question whether an instructor should be presented on online lecture slides is equivocal and two lines of theoretical reasoning exist. On the one hand, the instructor may distract from the content, thereby hampering learning; on the other hand, the instructor may function as a social cue that triggers a more…