Study skills

Strategies specifically for formal study

Letters A and F affect test scores

February, 2010

In another demonstration of the many factors that affect exam success, three experiments have found that seeing the letter A before an exam makes a student more likely to perform better than if he sees the letter F instead.

In another demonstration of the many factors that affect exam success, three experiments involving a total of 131 college students have found that seeing the letter A before an exam makes a student more likely to perform better than if he sees the letter F instead. In the first experiment, 23 undergraduates took a word-analogies test, of which half were labeled "Test Bank ID: F" in the top right corner, and half "Test Bank ID: A". The A group got an average of 11.08 of 12 answers correct, compared to 9.42 for the F group. The same pattern was confirmed in two more studies. Moreover, performance of students whose exams were labeled "Test Bank ID:J" fell between those with the A and F test papers. While hard to believe, these findings are consistent with the many findings supporting the idea of "stereotype threat" (the tendency to do less well on a test when a person fears their performance could confirm a negative stereotype about their racial or gender group).

Reference: 

[154] Ciani, K. D. [1], & Sheldon K. M. [2]
(2010).  A versus F: The effects of implicit letter priming on cognitive performance.
British Journal of Educational Psychology. 80, 99 - 119.

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Age differences in the allocation of study time

Journal Article: 

Dunlosky, J. & Connor, L.T. (1997). Age differences in the allocation of study time account for age differences in memory performance. Memory and Cognition, 25, 691-700.

  • It is well-established that older adults commonly need to practice more than younger adults to achieve the same level of performance.
  • It may be that such age deficits in remembering are at least partly due to poorer monitoring of their learning.

It has been well-established that, compared to younger adults, older adults require more practice to achieve the same level of performance1. Sometimes, indeed, they may need twice as much2.

In the present study, two groups of adult subjects were given paired items to learn during multiple study-test trials. During each trial items were presented at the subject's pace. Afterwards the subjects were asked to judge how likely they were to be able to recall each item in a test.

It was found that people were very good at accurately judging the likelihood of their correct recall. Correlations between judgments and the amount of time the subjects studied the items suggested that people were monitoring their learning and using this to allocate study time.

However, older adults (with a mean age of 67) used monitoring to a lesser degree than the younger adults (with a mean age of 22), and the results suggested that part of the reason for the deficit in recall commonly found with older adults is due to this factor.

References

1. For a review, see Kausler, D.H. 1994. Learning and memory in normal aging. New York: Academic Press.

2. Delbecq-Derousné, J. & Beauvois, M. 1989. Memory processes and aging: A defect of automatic rather than controlled processes? Archives of Gerontology & Geriatrics, 1 (Suppl), 121-150.

Salthouse, T.A. & Dunlosky, J. 1995. Analyses of adult age differences in associative learning. Zeitschrift für Psychologie, 203, 351-360

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Morningness a predictor of better grades in college

January, 2008

A survey of 824 undergraduate students has found that those who were evening types had lower average grades than those who were morning types.

Reference: 

The finding was presented at SLEEP 2008, the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS).

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