PS-I research demonstrates beneficial effects on conceptual knowledge and knowledge transfer relative to I-PS¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · theoretical r3 · q2
Currency · newest study 2025 · checked against its sources 2026-10-20 (automated, 1 of 1 entry) · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? Most PS-I studies comparing variants of PS-I to I-PS demonstrate beneficial effects of PS-I on conceptual knowledge outcomes and transfer of knowledge. → Katharina Loibl · Timo Leuders · Inga Glogger-Frey · Nikol Rummel 2025

Evidence¶

Katharina Loibl · Timo Leuders · Inga Glogger-Frey · Nikol Rummel 2025¶

Katharina Loibl · Timo Leuders · Inga Glogger-Frey · Nikol Rummel. (2025). CID: a framework for the cognitive analysis of composite instructional designs. Instructional Science. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-024-09665-9

q2 · i? · theoretical · r3

The article's narrative summary of the PS-I literature, attributing beneficial effects on conceptual knowledge and transfer to the cited studies. Reported as the review states it; the underlying studies were not re-analysed here beyond the framework application.

"Most studies on PS-I compare variants of PS-I to I-PS and demonstrate beneficial effects of PS-I on conceptual knowledge outcomes (e.g., DeCaro & Rittle-Johnson, 2012; Kapur & Bielaczyc, 2012; Loibl & Rummel, 2014; Weaver et al., 2018, for overviews see Loibl et al., 2017; Sinha & Kapur, 2021) and transfer of knowledge"

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• PS-I instructional designs can improve conceptual understanding and transfer when design principles are met — possibly the same claim (merge candidate)
• PS-I with a virus transmission simulation showed better transfer of multivariable causality to a new context, despite similar end-of-intervention performance to I-PS — a narrower finding that bears on this claim
• Productive Failure Improves Conceptual Learning — a narrower finding that bears on this claim
• Across two studies that differed in the duration of the initial problem-solving phase, the PS-I versus WS-I transfer advantage reversed — related
• PS-I sequence outperforms I-PS on conceptual knowledge only when instruction builds on student solutions — related
• PS-I effects did not replicate in all domains: null sequence effects in Bayesian reasoning, javelin throwing, and inquiry-skill sequencing — reports the opposite
• PS-I fosters learning only if specific design features (contrasting cases or building instruction on student solutions) are implemented — related
• For biochemistry students with relatively higher topic-specific prior knowledge, instruction-first (I-PS) outperformed problem-solving-first (PS-I) on a near-transfer test — reports the opposite
• Across studies, high solution rates in the initial problem-solving phase co-occur with beneficial PS-I effects and low rates with no beneficial effects, a cross-study pattern not yet tested in a shared sample — a narrower finding that bears on this claim
• In PS-I, prompting students to generate multiple strategies during the initial phase generally outperformed inventing one strategy or I-PS — a narrower finding that bears on this claim