Effects of Reflection Prompts When Learning with Hypermedia

In this study the assumption was tested experimentally, whether prompting for reflection will enhance hypermedia learning and transfer. Students of the experimental group were prompted at each navigation step in a hypermedia system to say the reasons why they chose this specific information node out loud whereas the students of the control group learned without reflection prompting. University students (N = 46) participated and were counterbalanced according to their prior knowledge, metacognitive knowledge, and verbal intelligence. The students' task was to learn the concepts of operant conditioning within 35 minutes. Students were completely free in navigation and students' individual learning sessions were videotaped. Immediately afterwards learning outcome was obtained. As expected, students learning with reflection prompts showed better transfer performance compared to the control group, especially if their navigation was based on strategic decisions. Even though prompting for reflection was successful, ways of further optimizing this kind of metacognitive intervention are discussed.

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