Production benefits learning: The production effect endures and improves memory for text

Abstract

The production effect is the superior retention of material read aloud relative to material read silently during an encoding episode. Thus far it has been explored using isolated words tested almost immediately. The goal of this study was to assess the efficacy of production as a study strategy, addressing: (a) whether the production benefit endures beyond a short session, (b) whether production can boost memory for more complex material, and (c) whether production transfers to educationally relevant tests. In Experiment 1 a 1-week retention interval was included, and a production effect was observed. In Experiment 2 a production effect was observed for both word pairs and sentence stimuli. In Experiment 3 educationally relevant essays were read and tested with a fill-in-the-blanks test: Memory was superior for questions that probed information that had been read aloud relative to information that had been read silently. We conclude that the production benefit is enduring and generalises to text and different test formats, indicating that production constitutes a worthwhile study strategy.

Keywords:

• Memory
• Recognition
• Production effect
• Learning
• Distinctiveness

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) discovery grant A7459. We thank Clark Amistad, Grace Hsiao, Jingjing Ji, Dushianthini Kenthirarajah, and Shelbie Sutherland for their assistance in collecting the data. We also thank Jason Chan for providing the materials used in Experiment 3.

Notes

¹Note that subsequent studies that present both aloud and silent study items for a set amount of time also lead to a production effect, so there is no concern that the effect somehow rests on shorter presentation rates of the aloud items at study.

²Note that false alarms did not differ between experiments, t(39) = 0.04, p=.97.