An application of reader response criticism, with its abundance of ways of construing readers, permits writing teachers to identify sets of readers for students more effectively than simply exhorting them to remember their audience while writing. Composition teachers can employ the concept of "narratee" (the author's alter ego) as a…

THE ELECTRONIC AGE BRINGS WITH IT NEW PATTERNS FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING. EDUCATORS AND LAYMEN NEED TO ORIENT THEMSELVES TO BE ABLE TO GRASP AND BENEFIT FROM THE NEW TECHNIQUES. THE BEGINNINGS OF THE EXPLOSION IN LEARNING ARE TRACED, STARTING WITH THE PRINTING PRESS. PRINTED BOOKS ALTERED PATTERNS OF STUDY MAKING IT POSSIBLE TO READ WIDELY WITHOUT…

THE TRANSFER OF THE EFFECTS OF TRAINING ONE RESPONSE UPON THE SUBSEQUENT TRAINING OF A DIFFERENT RESPONSE WERE DEMONSTRATED IN EXPERIMENTS USING VERBAL LABELS AND MOTOR RESPONSES. THE EXPERIMENTS PROVIDE AN EXPLANATION FOR LEARNING THAT IS A RESULT OF ASSOCIATING ONE RESPONSE WITH A STIMULUS PREVIOUSLY ASSOCIATED WITH ANOTHER RESPONSE. RESPONSES…

TWO GROUPS OF SUBJECTS, DESIGNATED PACED AND UNPACED, WERE USED TO DETERMINE WHETHER SELF-PACING IS ADVANTAGEOUS OR NECESSARY IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF EFFICIENT TECHNIQUES OF MEMORIZING. EACH GROUP LEARNED 8 LISTS OF 25 WORDS EACH, 2 LISTS PER SESSION. AT THE FIFTH SESSION, THE PACED GROUP LEARNED TWO ADDITIONAL LISTS UNDER SELF-PACED CONDITIONS.…

Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development and David Ausubel's assimilation theory of learning are explicated and selected research involving both theories is reviewed in this paper. The two theories are compared on selected dimensions to demonstrate that they are compatible and that, in conjunction with one another, they form a strong…

This is the final report of work accomplished on project SOCRATES (System for Organizing Content to Review and Teach Educational Subjects). The project contributed to the development and operation of a computer-based facility for psychological research on variables associated with pre-programed self-instruction (PSI) and self-programed…

The approach to problem solving which is presented has two components--closeness and reformulation. The closeness measure is a cognitively-based heuristic function. It incorporates the notion of what cognition notices as the structural difference between two situations. The problem-solver attempts to close the structural gap, and once this is done…

Three design strategies directly related to the development of instructional materials for rule learning were investigated. In the first of two experiments using both male and female tenth grade students, the degree of divergence between instances showed that contrasting irrelevant features resulted in better performance than matching irrelevant…

The question considered in this study is whether retroactive interference is influenced by a subject's prior knowledge of the material being studied. Two parallel passages of fictitious biographical information and an accompanying twenty-item short answer criterion test were developed. The fifteen subjects in the experimental group were told that…

Educational technology involves the application of psychology and equipment to the solution of educational problems. Teaching is facilitated when the interrelationships of variables such as time allowed for learning perseverence, quality of instructional materials, affective behavior and goals, and aptitude are considered. In order for educational…

This report attempts to determine to what extent the thesis that observation is theory-dependent holds in the area of verbal learning theory. This area was chosen because: (1) a philosophical criticism of verbal learning theory will contribute to the difficult task of investigating the border area between philosophy and psychology; and (2) no one…

The major goals of this postdoctoral study were preparation in psycholinguistics, and training and experience in the field of reading, as well as a review and updating of competence in learning and child development. The first semester was spent at the Educational Testing Service, Princeton, N.Y., working on a project designed to test the…

Three papers are presented, and each is followed by two reactions. The first paper presents methods of dealing with questions about the conduct of scientific theorizing. The theory-models approach is explained as a mode for conducting part of the theory construction tasks required in the complete act of scientific inquiry. In the second paper a…