- The Situation with Respect to the Spacing of Repetitions
and Memory 
- Theoretical implications of the spacing effect
- Component-levels theory of the effects of spacing of repetitions on recall and recognition

References dealing with the origins of the spacing effect (early literature)

Conditioning in non-human animals:
- Long-term habituation of a defensive withdrawal reflex in Aplysia

Verbal learning:
- Maintenance of foreign language vocabulary and the spacing effect

Motor learning:
- Contextual interference effects on the acquisition, retention, and transfer of a motor skill

Learning educational material:
- An information-processing analysis of college teaching
- Self-regulated spacing in a massive open online course is related to better learning

References displaying the spacing effect in different domains

- Learning Concepts and Categories: Is Spacing the “Enemy of Induction”?
- Utilizing learning analytics to map students' self-reported study strategies to click behaviors in STEM courses.
- Does mediator use contribute to the spacing effect for cued recall? Critical tests of the mediator hypothesis.

References on the effects of spacing compared to massing

- Origins of the spacing effect (early literature)
- Displays of spacing effect in different domains
- Spacing v. Massing

University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

Long-term recall is improved when studying is broken up into many short sessions rather than long concentrated ones (memory consolidation is improved). 

Spacing effect

Types of references on the spacing effect

The spacing effect has been shown to improve long-term recall in a variety of domains such as: 
- Conditioning (even in non-human animals)
- Verbal learning
- Motor learning
- Learning educational material

Scope of the spacing effect (different domains)

Spacing has shown to improve long-term recall more than massing by many studies. Some people however (such as E.Z. Rothkopf during in September of 1977), have posited that massing is better mode of studying when dealing with problems of induction. Kornell, N., & Bjork (2008) presented compelling evidence against this claim (spacing is also better for induction).

Effects of Spacing compared to Massing

The two main variables influencing the spacing effect are the spacing interval (lag) and the retention interval (test delay).

Spacing effect variables

A memory strategy where one associates multiple items with each other by using imagery, sentence generation, or other strategies (e.g. dog and spoon).

Mediators

Spacing out study sessions over time rather than cramming in one night has been found to be highly effective, especially in long-term retention of information.

Rated as high utility. It has wide generalization, is easy to implement and has been found to effectively boost academic performance.


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