Premium
V.—A n E xperiment on P ractice , C oaching and D iscussion of E rrors in M ental T esting
Author(s) -
HEIM A. W.,
WATTS K. P.
Publication year - 1957
Publication title -
british journal of educational psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.557
H-Index - 95
eISSN - 2044-8279
pISSN - 0007-0998
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8279.1957.tb01411.x
Subject(s) - coaching , test (biology) , psychology , session (web analytics) , personality , developmental psychology , applied psychology , clinical psychology , social psychology , psychotherapist , paleontology , world wide web , computer science , biology
S ummary .— An experiment was conducted in an attempt to reconcile the conflicting results reported on coaching and practice effects in mental testing. Parallel and identical (spatial) tests were administered weekly, to 13‐ and 14‐year‐old boys and girls, drawn from six schools. On the basis of first test score, every form was divided into five equated sub‐groups each of which subsequently received different treatment. Two sub‐groups took the same test (Test 1) for six consecutive weeks, one of these receiving coaching but not the other. The remaining three sub‐groups took a different (parallel) test each week, receiving between sessions either coaching or discussion of previous week's errors or neither. At the final session, every sub‐group took Test 7. The experimental results are confused by the fact that inter‐school differences equalled or exceeded inter‐group differences. The conclusions which follow are, therefore, offered tentatively: (a) Discussion of errors is the most effective improver of performance on a new test, (b) Coaching plus practice is more efficacious than practice alone, whether the practice task be the re‐taking of identical or of parallel tests, (c) Coaching plus practice‐on‐the‐same‐test produces better performance on a new test than does practice alone on different tests, (d) Practice alone on the same test yields the poorest result, on the criterion of performance on a new test. Personality differences among individuals and groups are found to contribute materially to the results.