Title | Assessing structure building in college classrooms at scale |
Publication Type | Journal Article |
Year of Publication | 2020 |
Authors | Soicher, RN, Becker-Blease, KA |
Journal | Applied Cognitive PsychologyApplied Cognitive PsychologyAppl Cognit Psychol |
Volume | 34 |
Issue | 3 |
Pagination | 747 - 753 |
Date Published | 2020/05/01 |
ISBN Number | 0888-4080 |
Keywords | higher education, measurement, reader ability, structure building, translational science |
Abstract | Summary Structure building refers to the way in which people construct meaning from incoming information by creating a foundation of mental nodes, mapping incoming information to the foundational structure, and shifting to a new structure when necessary. Structure building ability has been shown to moderate learning both in laboratory-based and classroom-based research (e.g., use of outlines for effective note-taking and course final grades, respectively). However, measurement of structure building can be resource intensive. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate a shortened, scalable measure of structure building (developed by a textbook publisher) in a real-world context. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that this tool, embedded in the online ancillary materials accompanying a textbook, can be used to measure a variable that is relevant to students' learning in introductory psychology courses. |
URL | https://doi.org/10.1002/acp.3643 |
Short Title | Applied Cognitive Psychology |