Individual Differences in Skill Retention.

Abstract : This article discusses the fact that if practice continues long enough, most subjects will stop improving before the practice ends. In such a case, individual subjects may be said to differ in how much they are 'overpracticed' at their end-of-practice levels. If practice is relatively short, however, almost all subjects will still be improving when it ends. In this case, subjects differ in rate of improvement late in practice, even though no subject may be overpracticed. In this article, evidence is presented that when end-of-practice level is statistically controlled, the more an individual is overpracticed at his or her end-of-practice level, or the more slowly he or she is improving late in practice, the better skill retention tends to be. Evidence is also presented that rate of improvement early in practice has no effect on retention not mediated by end-of-practice level, and either overpractice or rate of improvement late in practice.