MEANINGFUL VS. ROTE LEARNING IN PAIRED ASSOCIATE

An experiment was carried out to examine i) the effectiveness of meaningful learning over rote learning, and i i) the interaction between meaningfulness of learning and the methods of presentation.<BR>Three sets of 8 pairs of a simulus (S) and a response word (R) were learned. The pair in the lst set consisted of a word as S and a nonsense syllable (NS) as R. The pair in the the 2nd set had a word as S and two NSs, which had already been learned in the lst set, as R. What the word in the 2nd set represented was equivalent to the combined meaning of the words in the lst set, which had been associated to the NSs, elements of R. For example, a pair of (water-bottle...MUMA, NUYO) in the 2nd set implied the association (water-bottle... water, vessel), because Ss had learned in the 1st set that (water...MUMA) and (vessel...NUYO).<BR>The pair in the 3rd set had a word as S and 3 NSs as R. Learning the lst and the 2nd set, Ss had established an experimental “cognitive structure” which were relevant to the learning of the 3rd set. Similarly to the 2nd set, a half of the pairs in the 3rd set coulct be learned meaningfully, i. e. subsumed into the “cognitive structure” in a non-arbitrary and non-verbatim fashion. Another half of the pairs, however, could only be learned by rote, because what S (a word) meant was different from the combination of the meanings of the 3 NSs which had been acquired at the previous stages of learning.<BR>Two different but equivalent forms were prepared for the lst and 2nd 8 pairs, controlling the difficulties of individual pairs in the 3rd set.(NSs in the lst set were common to both forms.) Those who had learned the one form could learn a half of the pairs in the 3rd set meaningfully, while those who had learned another form could learn another half meaningfully.<BR>Each pair was written on a drawing paper, S in the upper and R in the lower row. In the learning of the lst and 2nd sets,(10 and 3 trials respectively) only S was presented for 2 sec. at first then both S and R were presented for 8 sec. For the 3rd set (3 trials), S was presented for 10 sec., during which Ss were instructed to recall the paired R, then S and R for 5 sec.(S→SR presentation); S and R were presented simultaneously for 15 sec.(SR presentation).<BR>Four classes of 7 grades served as Ss. The experiment was administered to one class at a time. Those who could recall R to S of the 8 pairs were selected and matched for their intelligence test results. Four homogeneous groups, each comprising 14 Ss, were produced.<BR>The number of correct responces in the recall test, to the meaningfully-learned vs. rotely-learned pairs, was counted for the both methods of presentation.<BR>The results were as follows: 1) The paird associate which was constructed to permit meaningful learning, was learned much more easily than that which had to be learned by rote.<BR>2) The interaction between meaningfulness and the methods of presentation was not statistically significant. Moreover, contrary to our hypothesis that in meaningful learning, a recall of R to a presented S would facilitate S-R association, the difference between SR presentation and S-SR presentation was larger in meaningful learing.