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Before yesterdayOnline First Publication: Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition

Correction to β€œA grain of truth in the grain size effect: Retrieval practice is more effective when interspersed during learning” by Don et al. (2024).

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, Jan 13, 2025, No Pagination Specified; doi:10.1037/xlm0001461

Reports an error in "A grain of truth in the grain size effect: Retrieval practice is more effective when interspersed during learning" by Hilary J. Don, Shaun Boustani, Chunliang Yang and David R. Shanks (Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 2024[Nov], Vol 50[11], 1791-1810). In the article, the copyright attribution was incorrectly listed, and the Creative Commons CC BY license disclaimer was incorrectly omitted from the author note. The correct copyright is β€œ2024 The Author(s),” and the omitted disclaimer is present as: Open Access funding provided by University College London: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0; https://creativecommons .org/licenses/by/4.0). This license permits copying and redistributing the work in any medium or format, as well as adapting the material for any purpose, even commercially. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2025-46535-001). Retrieval practice is a powerful method for consolidating long-term learning. When learning takes place over an extended period, how should tests be scheduled to obtain the maximal benefit? In an end-test schedule, all material is studied prior to a large practice test on all studied material, whereas in an interim test schedule, learning is divided into multiple study/test cycles in which each test is smaller and only assesses material from the preceding study block. Past investigations have generally found a difference between these schedules during practice but not during a final assessment, although they may have been underpowered. Five experiments confirmed that final assessment performance was better in students taught using interim than end tests in list (Experiments 1, 2, and 5) and paired associate (Experiments 3 and 4) learning, with a meta-analysis of all available studies (k = 19) yielding a small- to medium-sized effect, g = 0.25, 95% confidence interval [0.09, 0.42]. Experiment 5 finds that the higher level of practice retrieval success in interim tests contributes to the grain size effect, but the effect is eliminated if these tests are too easy. Additional analyses also suggest that the forward testing effect, in which tests promote subsequent learning, may be a major cause of the grain size effect. The practical and theoretical implications of these demonstrations of robust grain size effects are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved)

Category learning processes in the light of variability: Insights from a self-regulated category learning task.

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, Dec 30, 2024, No Pagination Specified; doi:10.1037/xlm0001422

Category learning is essential for making sense of the complex world around us. Unlike traditional laboratory settings, real-world learning often allows individuals to self-regulate their learning process, deciding when they have acquired sufficient knowledge to differentiate between categories. This study investigates how category variabilityβ€”the extent to which exemplars within a category differβ€”shapes the duration of the learning process in a novel self-regulated task. Participants explored exemplars from two categories, determining for themselves when they had learned enough to categorize accurately. We found that increased variability within the focal category led participants to sample more extensively, suggesting that learners weigh the costs of continued exploration against the uncertainty introduced by environmental demands. Additionally, the variability of the counter-category emerged as a significant factor influencing the search and learning process, underscoring the relational nature of category acquisition. By examining the interplay between variability in both focal and counter-categories, this study provides novel insights into how learners acquire categories and effectively regulate their learning in response to variability. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved)

False contingency knowledge reverses the color–word contingency learning effect.

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, Dec 30, 2024, No Pagination Specified; doi:10.1037/xlm0001413

In learning research, there is an ongoing debate about the role of awareness in human contingency learning. While a large part of the contingency learning (CL) effect actually reflects episodic retrieval of previous responses (C. G. Giesen et al., 2020; Schmidt et al., 2020), a significant residual CL effect remains, which reflects a genuine impact of global contingencies on behavior (Rudolph & Rothermund, 2024; Xu & Mordkoff, 2020). In a highly powered (N = 120) preregistered study, we tested the influence of contingency awareness on the genuine CL effect by giving true or false instructions about the existing color–word contingencies. We found that the genuine CL effect is modulated by awareness, as true (false) instructions amplified (reduced) the residual CL effect (see also Schmidt & De Houwer, 2012). Further, participants who maintained the belief in the falsely instructed contingencies until the end of the experiment actually showed a reversed genuine CL effect, characterized by faster responses in low contingency trials that corresponded to the falsely instructed color–word combination. In sum, our findings suggest that genuine human CL, which is free from the influence of episodic retrieval, reflects propositional beliefs rather than association formation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved)
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