A RESEARCH DESIGN FOR AN EXPERIMENT IN HUMAN MEMORY
Extensive research has been conducted to investigate the relation between the presentation style used in the transfer of information and the retention of that information by target individuals (Moeser, 1978, p. 290). The general trend in this research has been to link higher rates of retention with a presentation style that incorporates questions posed to the target subjects during the information transfer (Kaplan and Simmons, 1974, p. 619). Anderson and Biddle (1975, p. 78) found, however, that the link between higher rates of retention and a presentation style that incorporates questions posed to the target subjects during the information transfer is heavily dependent on the placement of the questions during the transfer.
Moeser (1978, pp. 290 303) conducted a study to test the contention of Anderson and Biddle (1975, p. 78). In that study, it was found that, when the information transfer was accompanied by questions that encouraged subjects to pay attention to the interrelationships between the ideas contained in a sequence of information, retention was better than that for a control group that experienced no questioning during the transfer of information. By contrast, however, Moeser (1978, p. 290) found that, when the information transfer was accompanied by questions that encouraged subjects to break the flow of the narrative, retention was worse than that for a control group that experienced no questioning during the information transfer.
The research that is proposed herein will attempt to partially replicate the Moeser (1978, pp. 290 303) study. The
plan for the conduct of this research is presented in the remaining sections of this paper.
One hypothesis will be tested in the proposed research. This hypothesis is stated as follows:
It is hypothesized that subjects receiving the transfer of information accompanied by questions that encouraged subjects...