Hulme Rachael C, Rodd Jennifer M
Department of Experimental Psychology, University College London, London, UK.
Aston Institute of Health and Neurodevelopment and School of Psychology, Aston University, Birmingham, UK.
PeerJ. 2021 Aug 10;9:e11693. doi: 10.7717/peerj.11693. eCollection 2021.
This study investigated how word meanings can be learned from natural story reading. Three experiments with adult participants compared naturalistic incidental learning with intentional learning of new meanings for familiar words, and examined the role of immediate tests in maintaining memory of new word meanings. In Experiment 1, participants learned new meanings for familiar words through incidental (story reading) and intentional (definition training task) conditions. Memory was tested with cued recall of meanings and multiple-choice meaning-to-word matching immediately and 24 h later. Results for both measures showed higher accuracy for intentional learning, which was also more time efficient than incidental learning. However, there was reasonably good learning from both methods, and items learned incidentally through stories appeared less susceptible to forgetting over 24 h. It was possible that retrieval practice at the immediate test may have aided learning and improved memory of new word meanings 24 h later, especially for the incidental story reading condition. Two preregistered experiments then examined the role of immediate testing in long-term retention of new meanings for familiar words. There was a strong testing effect for word meanings learned through intentional and incidental conditions (Experiment 2), which was non-significantly larger for items learned incidentally through stories. Both cued recall and multiple-choice tests were each individually sufficient to enhance retention compared to having no immediate test (Experiment 3), with a larger learning boost from multiple-choice. This research emphasises (i) the resilience of word meanings learned incidentally through stories and (ii) the key role that testing can play in boosting vocabulary learning from story reading.
本研究调查了如何从自然的故事阅读中学习词义。三项针对成年参与者的实验比较了自然情境下的偶然学习与对熟悉单词新词义的有意学习，并考察了即时测试在维持新词义记忆方面的作用。在实验1中，参与者通过偶然（故事阅读）和有意（定义训练任务）两种条件学习熟悉单词的新词义。通过线索回忆词义和多项选择的词义与单词匹配，在即时和24小时后对记忆进行测试。两种测量方法的结果都显示有意学习的准确率更高，而且有意学习比偶然学习更省时。然而，两种方法都有相当不错的学习效果，通过故事偶然学到的内容在24小时内似乎更不容易遗忘。有可能即时测试中的检索练习有助于学习，并在24小时后提高对新词义的记忆，尤其是在偶然故事阅读条件下。随后的两项预注册实验考察了即时测试在熟悉单词新词义长期保持中的作用。对于通过有意和偶然条件学到的词义，存在很强的测试效应（实验2），通过故事偶然学到的项目的测试效应略大但不显著。与没有即时测试相比，线索回忆和多项选择测试各自都足以增强记忆保持（实验3），多项选择带来的学习提升更大。这项研究强调了（i）通过故事偶然学到的词义的持久性，以及（ii）测试在促进从故事阅读中学习词汇方面可以发挥的关键作用。
