Direct and Indirect Effects of Completion Versus Accuracy Contingencies on Practice-Exam and Actual-Exam Performance

Students in four sections of an undergraduate educational course (two large and two small sections) took out-of-class practice exams prior to actual exams for each of five course units. Each course unit consisted of five class sessions focusing on a specific developmental theme. Some sections received practice-exam credit based on the number of items completed, whereas other sections received practice-exam credit based on the number of items answered accurately. The contingencies were applied only to the practice exams. A two-way MANOVA included two independent variables (practice-exam contingency and group size) and two dependent variables (practice-exam performance and unit-exam performance). The analysis revealed a main effect for both independent variables across both dependent variables, with students performing better under the accuracy than the completion contingency and better in the small than the large groups. One exception to this overall pattern was a non-significant difference between the large and small groups on the practice exams across both contingencies.     

THE EFFECTS OF PEER TUTORING WITH GROUP CONTINGENCIES ON THE ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF COLLEGE STUDENTS1

Improving the academic performance of college students who do not demonstrate mastery of course material is a major concern in traditional and nontraditional systems of instruction, where students may drop out, take incompletes, or continue to perform at low levels. The present study examined within-course peer tutoring as a potential solution. Twenty-one undergraduate students enrolled in a three-credit introductory course in Educational Psychology served as subjects. The class met one and a half hours each weekday for five weeks. Five students withdrew from the course and one student was placed on independent study before assignments to experimental conditions were made. The primary source materials were portions of Skinner's Technology of Teaching, plus two additional articles. The material was divided into nine equal units, each unit accompanied by study objectives. Nine one-hour essay exams were administered, one every other class day. Two review days were scheduled before a cumulative final was administered. Students could score a total of 20 points on each exam and the final. If a student scored 90% or better on an exam a score of 10 was earned. If a student scored 80% to 90%, a score of eight was awarded, and so on. A total score of 90 of 100 possible points at semester's end earned a student an “A”, 80 a “B”, and so on. The study consisted of three phases: Baseline I, Intervention, and Baseline II. Baseline I: after an initial introductory class, three lectures were presented—one for each unit. Each lecture day was followed by an exam day. Intervention: following the third exam, students were rank ordered and divided into high, medium, and low levels of performance on the basis of their raw scores on the previous three exams, and assigned to a paired or independent group. This assignment procedure resulted in three high-low pairs, three middle-middle pairs, two high-middle pairs, three low-independent students, and two middle-independent students. If, and only if, both students in a pair met a 90% mastery criterion on an exam did each receive five bonus points for the exam(s) reaching the criterion. The bonus points were used to offset points lost on the cumulative final. If both students in a pair met the 90% mastery criterion for units 4, 5, and 6, the pair received an automatic score of 10 on the cumulative final and had the two review days off. Other students who studied independently received identical payoffs if they met the same mastery criterion. The previous lecture time was used for inclass study. Baseline II: Baseline I procedures were reinstituted for the final three units. The test scores are the independent and paired students are shown in Figure 1. Compared to baseline, performance during peer tutoring improved for every student paired with a high partner, and not for those students who studied independently. Between-group comparisons suggest that the effective variables were related to the tutoring or its combination with the group contingency. However, the opportunity for intergroup discussion about treatment procedures and unequal assignment of subjects to the tutored and independent groups make conclusions about the between-group portion of the experiment tentative. Half to two-thirds of the students in each performance category viewed the peer-tutoring procedure favorably, and two-thirds or more reported that the procedure was effective in improving academic performance. Proportionately fewer students assigned to independent study found that procedure effective or viewed it favorably. It appears that pairing students with others who do better on tests and rewarding them for their combined performance results in considerable improvement in the performance of lower-level students.     

Effects of imposed postfeedback delays in programmed instruction

Imposed postfeedback delays promote discrimination training; the present experiments determined whether they also improve performance in programmed instruction. In two experiments, college students completed 45 sets of Holland and Skinner's (1961) programmed text on behavior analysis in a computerized format in a three-component multiple schedule. In Experiment 1, the conditions were (a) no delay between questions, (b) a 10-s delay after each question (noncontingent delay), and (c) a 10-s delay after each question answered incorrectly (contingent delay). Noncontingent delay produced better performance than no delay and contingent delay. To determine whether performance increased in the noncontingent delay condition because subjects studied the material during delay periods, Experiment 2 tested three conditions: (a) no delay between questions, (b) a 10-s delay after each question (noncontingent delay), and (c) a 10-s delay after each question with the screen blank during the delay period. Noncontingent delay produced better performance than no delay, but there was no difference in performance between no delay and noncontingent delay with blank screen. Hence, noncontingent delay improved performance because students used delay periods to study. Furthermore, subjects preferred noncontingent delay to the other conditions, and session time increased only slightly.     

College-level instruction: derived relations and programmed instruction

Recent research has demonstrated the effectiveness of programmed instruction that integrates derived relations to teach college-level academic material. This method has been demonstrated to be effective and economical in the teaching of complex mathematics and biology concepts. Although this approach may have potential applications with other domains of college learning, more studies are needed to evaluate important technological variables. Studies that employ programmed instruction are discussed in relation to future directions for research.     

EFFECTS OF INVENTED SPELLING AND DIRECT INSTRUCTION ON SPELLING PERFORMANCE OF SECOND-GRADE BOYS

Four second-grade boys, 2 rated by their classroom teacher as below average and 2 as above average in basic language skills, participated in a 16-week spelling investigation. The participants alternately received, in counterbalanced order, 5 weeks of an invented spelling approach that incorporated 15-min creative writing periods and 5 weeks of direct instruction that involved 15-min periods of guided practice on spelling word lists. At the end of 10 weeks, each condition was replicated for 3 additional weeks. Although direct instruction resulted in more targeted words spelled correctly, invented spelling resulted in more nontargeted words spelled correctly, higher preference ratings by children, and higher teacher ratings of the quality of 3 of the children's writing samples.     

大学生的社会网络

在系统回顾大学生社会网络的内涵、维度与测量的基础上, 从家庭与个体方面厘清大学生社会网络的影响因素, 其中个体因素可进一步划分为人口统计学特征、内隐特质以及外显行为方式等因素; 同时, 基于影响效果的时空特点, 从近端与远端两个视角概括了大学生社会网络对其校内态度、行为以及毕业后就业、创业影响的过程机制。未来可以从大学生社会网络维护策略、网络动态性演变等方面进行探索性研究。     

英语阅读策略培训对非英语专业本科生的影响*

旨在探讨英语阅读策略培训对非英语专业本科生英语阅读策略使用情况以及英语成绩的影响。对非英语专业大学生进行了一学期的英语阅读策略培训,使用几次英语阅读测试和自编的英语阅读策略调查问卷对实验组和对照组进行前后测。研究结果发现:(1)英语阅读策略培训能有效提高学生英语阅读策略的使用频率,帮助他们取得更好的阅读成绩;(2)与高水平学习者相比,中、低水平学习者可从策略培训中获得更大的收益。     

EVALUATION OF A REINFORCEMENT PROCEDURE FOR ACCELERATING WORK RATE IN A SELF-PACED COURSE1

Students in a self-paced child development course were assigned to one of seven groups. One bonus point, which contributed toward the student's final grade, was given for each unit completed during a specified two-week period. In a combined baseline-reversal design, bonus points could be earned at different times for each group, and some groups had weeks without bonus points interspersed between bonus weeks. All seven groups and 78% of individual students completed units at a faster rate during bonus periods than during the balance of the semester. For the 58 students completing the course, mean units per week during bonus periods was 2.40 (SD = 1.60); for the balance of the semester mean units per week was 0.96 (SD = 0.37). Awarding bonus points for a limited period early in the term appears to be a useful procedure for increasing rates during this period in which rates are typically low. Although similar effects have been reported by others (e.g., Miller, Weaver, and Semb, Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 1974, 7 , 87–91), the advantage of the present procedure is that the increase in rate is accomplished by means of reinforcement for high rates rather than punishment (low grades or forced withdrawal) for low rates.     

A behavioral technology for producing concept formation in university students

Three experiments analyzed the effectiveness of a textbook incorporating "concept programming" in producing concept formation in university students. The concept programming portion of each lesson requires students to determine which concept is illustrated by each of 20 short fictional stories about everyday behavioral situations. The stories are selected to illustrate and contrast the concepts of that lesson. Student responses are heavily prompted during the initial stories of each lesson. The first experiment demonstrated that students generalize to entirely novel examples from the examples in the textbook. The second experiment demonstrated that the concept programming portion of the textbook is a critical component in producing generalization. The third experiment demonstrated that the amount of concept formation produced by the concept programmed textbook is greater than that produced by a widely used standard textbook.     

Analyse des prélèvements biologiques médico-légaux : quel cadre juridique à l’ère de la qualité?

Medico-legal autopsy sometimes requires the use of the Parasitology-Mycology specialty. Two recent medico-legal clinical cases, involving this specialty, have questioned us. First of all, may a non-conformity biological analytical (compared to accepted and accredited standards by COFRAC) fail the whole biological expertise, and thereafter, the medico-legal expertise of the file? The answer must consider that the raw result obtained as a result of a medical biology technique must be interpreted and discussed by the expert in the discipline (in this case by the parasitologist) before being included in the medical discussion and discussed by the medical examiner. The judgment is secondarily delivered by the judge according to his intimate conviction and without determining the probative value of the examination. Should a post-mortem biological examination be part of an expertise in medical biology or is it a technical and scientific examination? This answer is based on the previous one, considering the significant contribution of the expert who will bring his knowledge, interpreting and discussing the raw result. A simple technical and scientific examination would only provide the raw result without any assessment of the context and circumstances of the biological sample.