Department of Health and Kinesiology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, USA.
Department of Health and Kinesiology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, USA; US Army Medical Research Directorate-West, Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, Joint Base Lewis McChord, WA, USA.
Hum Mov Sci. 2021 Oct;79:102854. doi: 10.1016/j.humov.2021.102854. Epub 2021 Aug 7.
Although the learning benefits of interleaved practice schedules relative to blocked schedules are well-reported, the mechanisms underlying these effects are not fully understood. Researchers have generally suggested that random schedules of practice increase task-related information processing which arises due to switching between variations of the same task (or switching between different tasks). Thus, one potentially useful way to both probe and manipulate contextual interference is to pair it with error estimation during practice. Forced error estimation increases task-related information processing and recording these estimates provides insight into learners' self-awareness of their errors. In the present study, 84 participants were randomly allocated to four groups. Participants practiced a timing task under blocked or random schedules, with and without error estimations prior to feedback. During the acquisition phase, three target times were trained (1500, 1700, 1900 ms), with feedback delivered after every trial. We used delayed post-tests (24 hrs later) to evaluate the retention of these target times and their transfer to two new target times (1600, 1800 ms). Participants who practiced with a random schedule performed worse (i.e., greater absolute error) than those with a blocked schedule during acquisition (p = .006); however, randomly scheduled participants also showed reduced error (p = .004) on the retention and transfer tests. Although prompting error estimations led to greater self-reported mental effort being invested on the task (p = .001), error estimation was not reliably associated with superior learning (p = .133). The accuracy of error estimations did not differ as a function of practice structure (p = .070), although the accuracy of error estimations improved during acquisition (p = .006). Findings highlight the robustness of the contextual interference effect, but we did not find evidence that error estimations moderated the effect on this task. It is in some ways surprising that we found an effect of contextual interference, as past-work suggests that interference effects are attenuated (or eliminated) when participants switch between different parameters of the same task. We speculate that this might be due to the difficulty of the task; even though participants switched between parametric variations of the same task, the distinction between parameters was subtle (i.e., tenths of a second).
虽然交错练习时间表相对于阻塞练习时间表的学习益处已有充分报道，但这些效果的机制尚不完全清楚。研究人员普遍认为，随机练习时间表会增加与任务相关的信息处理，这是由于在同一任务的不同变体之间切换（或在不同任务之间切换）而产生的。因此，一种既可以探测又可以操纵上下文干扰的潜在有用方法是在练习过程中结合错误估计。强制错误估计会增加与任务相关的信息处理，记录这些估计值可以深入了解学习者对自己错误的自我意识。在本研究中，84 名参与者被随机分配到四个组。参与者在阻塞或随机时间表下练习，在反馈前进行或不进行错误估计。在获取阶段，训练了三个目标时间（1500、1700、1900ms），每次试验后都提供反馈。我们使用延迟后测试（24 小时后）来评估这些目标时间的保留情况及其对两个新目标时间（1600、1800ms）的转移情况。在获取过程中，与阻塞时间表相比，采用随机时间表练习的参与者表现更差（即绝对误差更大）（p=0.006）；但是，随机安排的参与者在保留和转移测试中也显示出较小的错误（p=0.004）。尽管提示错误估计会导致参与者在任务上投入更多的自我报告的心理努力（p=0.001），但错误估计与更好的学习没有可靠的关联（p=0.133）。错误估计的准确性与练习结构无关（p=0.070），尽管在获取过程中，错误估计的准确性有所提高（p=0.006）。研究结果突出了上下文干扰效应的稳健性，但我们没有发现错误估计可以调节对该任务的影响的证据。我们发现上下文干扰的效果令人惊讶，因为过去的研究表明，当参与者在同一任务的不同参数之间切换时，干扰效应会减弱（或消除）。我们推测，这可能是由于任务的难度所致；即使参与者在同一任务的参数变体之间切换，参数之间的区别也很微妙（即，十分之一秒）。
