ERIC Number: EJ1223211
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2019-Aug
Pages: 25
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0022-0663
EISSN: N/A
Refutation Texts Compensate for Detrimental Effects of Misconceptions on Comprehension and Metacomprehension Accuracy and Support Transfer
Prinz, Anja; Golke, Stefanie; Wittwer, Jörg
Journal of Educational Psychology, v111 n6 p957-981 Aug 2019
Misconceptions impair not only learners' comprehension of a text but also the accuracy with which they judge their comprehension, that is, "metacomprehension accuracy." Refutation texts are beneficial to elicit conceptual-change processes and thus to overcome the detrimental impact of misconceptions on comprehension. However, it is unclear whether refutation texts and the conceptual-change processes induced by reading them benefit metacomprehension accuracy in addition to comprehension and how robust these effects are when reading further texts. We conducted an experiment in which we asked 80 student teachers with a varying number of statistical misconceptions to read either a standard or a refutation text on statistics and assessed their comprehension and metacomprehension. In a subsample, we examined the students' conceptual-change processes during reading with the think-aloud methodology. Subsequently, we asked the students to read a research report that required the application of the previously acquired statistical knowledge and assessed their comprehension and metacomprehension again. The results revealed that the refutation text compensated for the detrimental impact of misconceptions on comprehension and metacomprehension accuracy. The think-aloud data indicated that when reading the refutation text, students with more misconceptions engaged in conceptual-change processes more actively, which in turn supported their comprehension and metacomprehension accuracy. Compensatory effects of the refutation text were also found when the students read the research report. In sum, the findings show that refutation texts are beneficial for both comprehension and metacomprehension accuracy and that these benefits transfer to situations where the acquired knowledge has to be put into practice.
Descriptors: Misconceptions, Accuracy, Metacognition, Reading Comprehension, Student Teachers, Concept Formation, Protocol Analysis, Learning Processes, Statistics, Expository Writing, Transfer of Training, Robustness (Statistics), Teacher Education Programs, Secondary School Teachers, Foreign Countries
American Psychological Association. Journals Department, 750 First Street NE, Washington, DC 20002. Tel: 800-374-2721; Tel: 202-336-5510; Fax: 202-336-5502; e-mail: order@apa.org; Web site: http://www.apa.org
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education; Secondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Germany
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A