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Optimal mismatch for transfer of planning skills by slow learners
Author(s) -
Todman John,
McBeth John
Publication year - 1994
Publication title -
british journal of developmental psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.062
H-Index - 75
eISSN - 2044-835X
pISSN - 0261-510X
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-835x.1994.tb00628.x
Subject(s) - psychology , task (project management) , competence (human resources) , transfer of training , mentally retarded , developmental psychology , transfer of learning , transfer (computing) , cognitive psychology , social psychology , computer science , management , parallel computing , economics
Studies with mentally retarded children frequently report failure to transfer learned strategies. It is possible that, although the children can be guided to succeed on a training task, the failure to transfer is due to there being too great a mismatch between the task and their current unaided level of performance. This suggestion was tested by comparing the transfer of a forward search planning strategy acquired by groups of retarded childen when the mismatch between training and current competence was varied. In one comparison, two groups, matched on initial developmental level within the task domain, were trained on either the next or the next‐but‐one step in a developmental sequence. In a second comparison, two groups were trained at the same level in the developmental sequence. For one group this represented the next available step in the sequence, and for the other group it was the next‐but‐one step. In each comparison, although the pairs of groups required the same number of trials and hints to reach a learning criterion, only the group trained on the step adjacent to their current level of unaided performance showed transfer.