Highlighting and rereading ineffective study methods

Psychological research on effective learning techniques has suggested that highlighting and rereading are ineffective ways to study. Practice testing and distributed practice, on the other hand, were labeled as highly useful when studying for your exams.

The researchers looked at ten learning techniques: elaborative interrogation, self-explanation, summarization, highlighting and underlining, the keyword mnemonic, imagery use for text learning, rereading, practice testing, distributed practice, and interleaved practice. They assessed the different techniques as having low, moderate or high utility.

Practice testing and distributed practice were ranked the highest, because they positively correlated with the performance of students. Elaborative interrogation, self-explanation, and interleaved practice got labeled as moderately useful. The other five techniques (summarization, highlighting, the keyword mnemonic, imagery use for text learning, and rereading) received a low utility ranking.

One of the outcomes of the research is that more investigation into learning methods is necessary to get a good view on how students can study at their best. The preliminary recommendation is that students should use other techniques than rereading and highlighting, such as practice testing and distributed practice. The funny thing is that although this article proves that rereading and highlighting are ineffective and do not boosts students’ performance, those techniques are used the most.

For the complete article click here.