A review chapter (Karpicke 2017) reports, second-hand, experiments in which retrieval practice produced more learning than concept mapping (Karpicke & Blunt 2011) and than imagery strategies such as the keyword mnemonic (Karpicke & Smith 2012)¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study (2 entries) · review r2–r3 · q2
Currency · newest study 2017 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? The chapter reports, citing Karpicke and Blunt (2011), that retrieval practice consistently produced more learning than concept mapping on a short-answer test 1 week later with verbatim and inference questions. → Karpicke 2017 q2 i? The chapter reports, citing Karpicke and Smith (2012), advantages of repeated retrieval practice over the keyword mnemonic and a mediator-generation strategy in vocabulary learning. → Karpicke 2017 (2)

Evidence¶

Karpicke 2017¶

Karpicke, J. D. (2017). Retrieval-Based Learning: A Decade of Progress. Learning and Memory: A Comprehensive Reference, 2nd edition, Volume 2. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-809324-5.21055-9

q2 · i? · review · r2

The chapter reports Karpicke and Blunt (2011) second-hand; the primary experiment is not recorded on this page, and the chapter's summary gives no sample size or effect size. In it, students read educational texts and practiced free recall or built concept maps; on a 1-week test, "Retrieval practice consistently produced more learning than elaborative studying with concept mapping did".

"Retrieval practice consistently produced more learning than elaborative studying with concept mapping did (see also Lechuga et al., 2015 )."

Karpicke 2017 (2)¶

Karpicke, J. D. (2017). Retrieval-Based Learning: A Decade of Progress. Learning and Memory: A Comprehensive Reference, 2nd edition, Volume 2. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-809324-5.21055-9

q2 · i? · review · r3

The chapter reports, second-hand, a series of vocabulary-learning experiments by Karpicke and Smith (2012), which are not themselves recorded on this page, that "showed advantages of repeated retrieval practice over elaborative imagery strategies", including the keyword mnemonic.

"In a series of experiments, Karpicke and Smith (2012) had students learn vocabulary words and showed advantages of repeated retrieval practice over elaborative imagery strategies, including the keyword mnemonic ( Atkinson, 1975) and a mediator-generation strategy ( Pyc and Rawson, 2010 )."

Discussion¶

Both entries are one review chapter's summaries of its author's own earlier experiments, so the page's evidence is second-hand: no sample size, design detail or effect size for Karpicke and Blunt (2011) or Karpicke and Smith (2012) is recorded. Adding those primary articles, and later studies that compared retrieval with concept mapping under other conditions (the chapter itself points to Lechuga et al. 2015), would let the claim be coded on its own evidence. Whether concept mapping helps on its own is a separate question; see concept mapping.

Related Claims¶

• Concreteness, imagery, and verbal associative processes play major roles across multiple educational domains — the general claim this finding bears on, with the studies behind it

• Existing theoretical accounts attributing the testing effect to enhanced semantic elaboration receive limited support — the general claim this finding bears on, with the studies behind it

• Concept mapping improves learning over most comparison conditions by a moderate average amount, but not over time-matched retrieval practice — the comparison condition here: this page reports retrieval outperforming it
• Retrieval Practice Improves Learning
• The same quizzing or concept-mapping activity produces more learning when done without viewing the material, as retrieval, than while viewing it — related
• Retrieval practice benefits extend to nonverbal visual materials, spatial map learning, and educational texts with different structures — related
• Initial retrieval conditions that provide less cue support, such as free recall rather than recognition or fewer letter cues, tend to produce better retention despite lower initial success — related
• Mnemonic Instruction Improves Recall For Students With Disabilities — related
• Quizzing outperforms no/filler activity, fewer-question testing and restudying, with a larger advantage over no/filler activity (low reexposure) than over restudying (high reexposure); against other elaborative strategies its advantage is small and not significant. — related
• Summarization, highlighting, the keyword mnemonic, imagery for text, and rereading receive low utility assessments — related
• Generation Effect Improves Retention — related
• An ICAP theory article reports, second-hand and without describing the design, a study in which concept mapping with a peer enhanced learning more than concept mapping alone — reports the opposite