Ability moderates the hierarchical-organization advantage: low-ability subjects showed no significant benefit, while medium-ability subjects did¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study (2 entries) · causal r1–r2 · q2–q3
Currency · newest study 1979 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person
Evidence quality · No study behind this claim is a peer-reviewed article with a DOI: it rests on an ERIC document (a report, conference paper or thesis). It is kept because 4 design pages cite it; treat it as a lead to check, not an established finding.

Subclaims¶

q3 i? Among low-ability subjects in Experiment 1 there was no significant difference between any treatment means; among medium-ability subjects the H treatment significantly exceeded the combined S1 and S2 mean. → Eylon 1979 q2 i? In Experiment 3, the four highest-ability subjects recalled on average about 57% of knowledge units versus about 20% for the four lowest-ability subjects. → Eylon 1979 (2)

Evidence¶

Eylon 1979¶

Eylon, Bat-Sheva; Reif, F. (1979). Effects of Internal Knowledge Organization on Task Performance. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED171804

q3 · i? · causal · r2

Experiment 1 Scheffe a-posteriori contrasts on complex-task scores by ability block: high-ability H and S2 subjects did not differ but both exceeded S1 (p<0.01); medium-ability H subjects exceeded the combined S1/S2 mean (p<0.01); low-ability subjects showed no differences. The two-way ANOVA also showed a significant ability effect (p<0.01).

"Among the low-ability subjects, there was no significant difference between any of the mean scores."

Eylon 1979 (2)¶

Eylon, Bat-Sheva; Reif, F. (1979). Effects of Internal Knowledge Organization on Task Performance. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED171804

q2 · i? · no effect size printed; the entry gives mean recall percentages for the four highest- and four lowest-ability subjects only (about 57% against about 20%) · causal · r1

Experiment 3 correlational observation: the two subjects whose retrieval paths could not be mapped onto their treatment organization were the two of lowest ability, and recall proportions rose with prior physics-course performance.

"the four subjects of highest ability recalled on the average about 57% of all the knowledge units, while the four subjects of lowest ability recalled on theaverage only about 20% of all these knowledge units."

Discussion¶

Learner Variables¶

• General Cognitive Ability — moderator: an instructional effect differs with it

Related Claims¶

• In the few studies that split by ability, learning techniques helped low-ability students and not high-ability students — the general claim this finding bears on, with the studies behind it
• A hierarchical internal knowledge organization facilitates performance on complex recall and problem-solving tasks more than a single-level organization of the same knowledge — related
• Hierarchical versus single-level organization does not significantly affect performance on local tasks relying only on individual detailed steps — related
• Advance organizers produce a small average learning benefit, larger for high-ability than for low-ability learners — related
• Information at higher levels of an acquired hierarchical organization is recalled better than information at lower levels — related
• A hierarchical organization facilitates tasks only when matched to the task domain: organization A aids deductive tasks and organization B aids historical tasks — related
• Algebra ability level differences appear on both criteria with no treatment-by-ability interaction — reports the opposite
• Prior knowledge moderated the VF-process advantage over PF: the benefit of observing the process grew with prior knowledge, while prior knowledge did not affect post-test performance in the PF condition — related
• Previous domain knowledge did not affect e-learning text comprehension, directly or as a moderator — related
• Self-questioning during study benefits low verbal ability high school students more than high verbal ability students (Experiment 1) — related
• Treatment x verbal ability interaction replicated only after excluding the high-variance middle ability group (Experiment 2) — related
• Proficiency moderates gloss effects: vocabulary benefits appear at Levels 2 and 3 but not Levels 1 and 4 — related
• Test-taker abilities and prior knowledge show inconsistent moderating effects on multimedia testing effects — reports the opposite
• Hierarchical top-down schema-based instruction improved transfer performance compared with single-level and control instruction — related