Publications by Joshua Fiechter
Testing is a powerful enhancer of memory. However, if initial encoding is poor, and subsequent re... more Testing is a powerful enhancer of memory. However, if initial encoding is poor, and subsequent retrieval practice is likely to fail, then the benefits of testing are diminished or even eliminated. Previous work has suggested that the benefits of testing may be preserved under difficult conditions with a scaffolded technique called diminishing-cues retrieval practice (DCRP; Fiechter & Benjamin, Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 25(5), 1868-1876, 2018). DCRP provides increasing retrieval demands over practice, but does not adapt to individual learners or to materials of varying difficulty. Here, we evaluate a new technique called adaptive-cues retrieval practice (ACRP). ACRP adapts to an individual's moment-to-moment ability by providing within-trial accumulated cuing, generating more demanding retrieval practice for better learned items. Across six experiments, learners practiced English-Iñupiaq word pairs using ACRP, standard retrieval practice, restudy, and DCRP. ACRP is even more effective than DCRP in situations where standard retrieval practice is ineffective. When testing is most effective, ACRP, DCRP, and standard retrieval practice all enhance memory to approximately the same degree, but DCRP requires the least practice time. Our findings suggest that DCRP is a more efficient technique for learning, but that the benefits of ACRP extend to more learning scenarios than those of any other identified practice regimen.
Video job interviews have become a common hiring practice, allowing employers to save money and r... more Video job interviews have become a common hiring practice, allowing employers to save money and recruit from a wider applicant pool. But differences in job candidates' internet connections mean that some interviews will have higher audiovisual (AV) quality than others. We hypothesized that interviewers would be impacted by AV quality when they rated job candidates. In two experiments, participants viewed two-minute long simulated Skype interviews that were either unedited (fluent videos) or edited to mimic the effects of a poor internet connection (disfluent videos). Participants in both experiments rated job candidates from fluent videos as more hirable, even after being explicitly told to disregard AV quality (experiment 2). Our findings suggest that video interviews may favor job candidates with better internet connections and that being aware of this bias does not make it go away.
Retrieval practice has been shown to be a highly effective tool for enhancing memory, a fact that... more Retrieval practice has been shown to be a highly effective tool for enhancing memory, a fact that has led to major changes to educational practice and technology. However, when initial learning is poor, initial retrieval practice is unlikely to be successful and long-term benefits of retrieval practice are compromised or nonexistent. Here, we investigate the benefit of a scaffolded retrieval technique called diminishing-cues retrieval practice (Finley, Benjamin, Hays, Bjork, & Kornell, Journal of Memory and Language, 64, 289–298, 2011). Under learning conditions that favored a strong testing effect, diminishing cues and standard retrieval practice both enhanced memory performance relative to re-study. Critically, under learning conditions where standard retrieval practice was not helpful, diminishing cues enhanced memory performance substantially. These experiments demonstrate that diminishing-cues retrieval practice can widen the range of conditions under which testing can benefit memory, and so can serve as a model for the broader application of testing-based techniques for enhancing learning.
Practice tests provide large mnemonic benefits over restudying, but learners judge practice tests... more Practice tests provide large mnemonic benefits over restudying, but learners judge practice tests as less effective than restudying. Consequently, learners infrequently utilize testing when controlling their study and often choose to be tested only on well-learned items. In 5 experiments, we examined whether learners' choices about testing and restudying are effective for improving subsequent memory performance. Learners studied a list of word pairs and chose which items to restudy and which to test. Some of learners' choices were honored (by assigning those items to the chosen activity) and some of learners' choices were dishonored (by assigning those items to the opposite study activity). Surprisingly, and in contrast with all work to date on the metacognitive monitoring of testing effects, honoring learners' testing choices consistently resulted in better memory performance than dishonoring choices. This effect occurred principally because learners often chose to restudy difficult items, and those items did not benefit from testing. The effectiveness of learners' choices about testing casts the metacognition of testing in a new light: learners may not appreciate the benefits of testing, but they do have an understanding of circumstances in which the benefits of testing are minimal.
In five experiments, we investigated whether expected retention intervals affect subjects' encodi... more In five experiments, we investigated whether expected retention intervals affect subjects' encoding strategies. In the first four experiments, our subjects studied paired associates consisting of words from the Graduate Record Exam and a synonym. They were told to expect a test on a word pair after either a short or a longer interval. Subjects were tested on most pairs after the expected retention interval. For some pairs, however, subjects were tested after the other retention interval, allowing for a comparison of performance at a given retention interval conditional upon the expected retention interval. No effect of the expected retention interval was found for 1 min versus 4 min (Exp. 1), 30 s versus 3 min (Exp. 2), and 30 s versus 10 min (Exps. 3 and 4), even when subjects were given complete control over the pacing of study items (Exp. 4). However, when the difference between the expected retention intervals was increased massively (10 min vs. 24 h; Exp. 5), subjects remembered more items that they expected to be tested sooner, an effect consistent with the idea that they traded off efforts to remember items for the later test versus items that were about to be tested. Overall, this set of results accords with much of the test-expectancy literature, revealing that subjects are often reluctant to adjust encoding strategies on an item-by-item basis, and when they do, they usually make quantitative, rather than qualitative, adjustments.
Papers by Joshua Fiechter
Topics in Cognitive Science
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Publications by Joshua Fiechter
Papers by Joshua Fiechter