used bold and analyzed testing versus more study time one week later

• Previous research has shown that the testing effect is especially powerful because people remember tested things better over time than other things that haven’t been tested
• Made the final test one week after the pre-test-had to come in around the same time of day
• Manipulated bolding within subjects and treatment type (extended study versus pre-test) between subjects
• Predicted that the final items tested at a delay would be better for pre-tested items than the bolded items in the extended study condition
• Predicted that bolding would be better than non bolding in the extended study condition but pre-testing overall would be better than bolding
• 158 undergraduates who were given extra credit for participating
• Only 5 items in the study material were bolded-on the post test out of the 10 items that were tested, 5 had been bolded (and in the pre-test group, was also tested)
• Participants answered 10% of the questions correctly on the pre-test
• Testing effects analyzed by bolded and tested vs. just bolded-significant pre-testing effect-M=55% & SE=2.0 vs. M=445% & SE=3.0
• Effects of bolding analyzed by bolded vs. unbolded in the extended time condition-small difference showing that bolding is effective in drawing attention to a specific subject
• Tested and bolded questions were recalled better than untested and unbolded questions
• This experiment shows that the testing effect works 1 week later-more specifically, bolding with testing significantly helped to improve performance