Learning from total failure: why do impossible tests boost learning?

在教育中，考试通常用来衡量学习情况。然而，在过去的十年里，大量的研究表明，考试也可以显著提高学习效果——即考试效果。最近，一项令人惊讶的发现表明，即使是在教授材料之前进行测试，也能提高学习效果。因此，当学生测试完全不熟悉的材料（例如外语词汇），并且不可避免地会把所有的测试问题都搞错时，该主题的后续学习就会得到加强。这种效应对教育环境有着非常重要的影响，我们试图理解这种效应发生的原因。测试效果的第一次演示包括三个阶段。参与者首先学习材料（如文本）。接下来，一组对材料进行测试，而另一组只是学习正确答案。最后一项测试评估了他们学习了多少知识。与重新学习材料相比，参加临时测试会导致更好的最终表现，后来的研究表明，如果通过反馈来纠正最初的答案，效果会进一步增强。对这种测试效应的一种可能解释是，在想到（错误的）答案后，人们会有很强的动力去学习正确的答案。这种特殊的解释表明，就像最近观察到的那样，在第一次接触待研究材料之前，测试可能是有帮助的。例如，如果你被要求猜测一个罕见的英语单词的意思，比如“roke”，在被告知它的真正含义之前（迷雾），那么你在以后的测试中会特别善于记住这个意思。在学习之前进行初始测试的好处（称为测试增强学习- TPL）是当前建议的重点。当前项目我们将在三方面的研究中测试一些关于初始测试（TPL）影响的可能解释。第一组和第二组将使用不熟悉的单词对和脸-词对。前者是外语项目（芬兰语名词及其英语含义），后者是不熟悉的面孔，以及与这些面孔相关的事实（如姓名/职业）。使用芬兰语词汇是因为它对外语学习有明确的含义。此外，芬兰语单词与英语单词特别不相似，这保证了初始测试的答案将是错误的。面孔-名字学习对更多的社交和工作场合都有影响。在最后的第三部分，将使用更复杂的基于单词的材料（文本和一般知识）来将第一和第二部分的发现扩展到一系列课堂情境中。参与者事先对这些材料一无所知。在一个使用芬兰语词汇的原型实验中，所有的实验都将从一个芬兰语单词的呈现开始。在“测试”条件下，参与者将被要求猜测单词的意思，然后才会被告知真实的意思。一个“研究”条件，其中没有猜测，将作为控制。根据我们实验室之前的研究，猜测可以增强对真实含义的记忆。Strand 1将探索最初的测试在多大程度上有利于学习，正是因为参与者犯了错误，所以他们对真实答案感到惊讶。斯特兰德2将研究人们在多大程度上更有动力去学习，或者在猜测之后改变他们的学习策略。也就是说，Strand 1检查潜在的“低级”学习机制（例如，错误纠正），而Strand 2则关注可能由测试产生的更“高级”战略过程。Strand 3中的实验将测试从Strand 1和Strand 2中发现的一般性到更复杂的任务，如一般知识学习。这条线的设计是为了扩大未来可能进行的更多应用研究的范围。

In education, a test is usually used to measure learning. However, the last decade has seen an explosion of research demonstrating that tests can also dramatically improve learning - the testing effect. Most recently, a surprising discovery has been made that a test can enhance learning even when it is given before the material has been taught. Hence, when students are tested completely unfamiliar material (e.g., foreign language vocabulary), and will inevitably get all the test questions wrong, subsequent learning of that topic is enhanced. This effect has very significant implications for educational settings, and we seek to understand why the effect occurs. The first demonstrations of the testing effect involved 3 phases. Participants first studied the material (e.g. a text). Next, one group took a test on the material, while a second group simply studied the correct answers. A final test assessed how much learning had taken place. Taking the interim test led to better final performance than restudying the material, and later research showed the effect was further enhanced if initial answers were corrected with feedback. One possible explanation for the testing effect is that after thinking of a (wrong) answer, people are highly motivated to learn the correct answer. This particular explanation suggests that testing might be helpful even before the first encounter with the to-be-studied material, as has recently been observed. For example, if you were asked to guess the meaning of a rare English word such as "roke" before ever being told its true meaning (mist), then you would be especially good at remembering that meaning on a later test. It is this benefit of initial tests prior to learning (known as test-potentiated learning - TPL) that is the focus of the current proposal. The Current ProjectWe will test a number of potential explanations for the effects of initial tests (TPL) in three strands of research. Strands 1 and 2 will use unfamiliar word pairs and face-word pairs. The former are foreign language items (Finnish nouns and their English language meanings), and the latter are unfamiliar faces, and facts associated with those faces (e.g. name/occupation). The Finnish vocabulary is used because it has clear implications for foreign language learning. Also, Finnish words specifically are not similar to English words, which guarantees that the answers to the initial test will be incorrect. Face-name learning has implications for more social and work-place situations. In the final Strand 3, more complex word-based materials (texts and general knowledge) will be used to extend the findings from Strands 1 and 2 to a range of classroom situations. Participants will know nothing about these materials in advance.In a prototypical experiment using Finnish vocabulary, all trials will start with the presentation of a Finnish word. In the "test" condition, participants will be asked to guess the meaning of the word before being given the true meaning. A "study" condition, in which no guess is made, will serve as the control. It is expected, given previous research in our laboratory, that guessing will enhance memory for the true meaning.Strand 1 will explore the extent to which initial tests benefit learning precisely because participants make errors, and so they are surprised by the true answer. Strand 2 will look at the extent to which people are more motivated to study, or likely to change their study strategies following a guess. That is, Strand 1 examines potential "low-level" mechanisms (e.g., error correction) of learning whereas Strand 2 looks at more "high-level" strategic processes that might result from being tested. The experiments in Strand 3 will test the generality of the findings from Strands 1 and 2 to more complex tasks such as general knowledge learning. This strand is designed to broaden the scope of more applied research that might be conducted in the future.