One of the tasks that you are often asked to do in the IB curriculum is read a study or text. As you probably know, when the teacher says, "Read this study for homework" without giving any further directions, you tend to read the text differently than if you are told, "Read this study for homework and make note of at least two concerns you have about the procedure."  In the first case, when you come to class and the teacher says, "What were some of the problems with the procedure?," you may find that you don't remember the procedure very well.  This often leads to frustration from both teachers and students - with teachers thinking that the students didn't read the text. They most probably did, but they didn't retain the text because they did not know where to focus their attention.

The activation of a learner's schema is the process in which “textual stimuli signal the direction or area for the reader to look for and evoke the relevant schema from memory into the present reading task” (Li, 1997). In the following study by Bransford and Johnson, they wanted to see if activating participants' schema would help them to remember details of a text.  They also wanted to see if activating the schema before or after the reading of the text made a difference.

The aim of the study was to determine if schema activation would result in better understanding and recall of an ambiguous text.

The sample was made up of 52 participants. They were allocated to one of three conditions.  In the No Topic group (n = 17), participants heard a passage with no additional information.  In the Topic After group (n = 17), participants were told the topic of the passage after hearing it.  In the Topic Before group (n = 18), participants were told the topic of the passage before hearing it.

All participants were told that they were going to hear a tape-recorded passage.  They were told that they would later be asked to recall the passage as accurately as possible.  All participants were tested at the same time, but they had different answer booklets.  For those who were in the Topic Before group, their instruction sheet said, "The paragraph you will hear will be about washing clothes."  After listening to the passage, they were asked to rate their comprehension of the passage on a 1 - 7 scale.  Then, on the final page of the booklet, they were asked to recall the passage as accurately as possible. The Topic After group's instructions included, "It may help you to know that the paragraph was about washing clothes." Participants were given five minutes for recall. (Please see the actual passage below).

The researchers had decided on "idea units" before the experiment. Each participants' summary was independently scored by two judges, using the list of 18 idea units.  The results can be seen in the table below.

The procedure is actually quite simple. First, you arrange things into different groups depending on their makeup. Of course, one pile may be sufficient depending on how much there is to do.  If you have to go somewhere else due to lack of facilities that is the next step, otherwise you are pretty well set.  It is important not to overdo any particular endeavor. That is, it is better to do too few things at once than too many.  In the short run, this may not seem important, but complications from doing too many can easily arise. A mistake can be expensive as well. The manipulation of the appropriate mechanisms should be self-explanatory, and we need not dwell on it here.  At first, the whole procedure will seem complicated.  Soon, however, it will become just another fact of life.  It is difficult to foresee any end to the necessity for this task in the immediate future, but then one never can tell.

The study used an independent samples design; participant variability with regard to experience with washing clothes may be a confounding variable.  A repeated measures design would not be possible as the text could not be reused.

The study is simplistic and is easily replicated.  This allows researchers to determine the reliability of the findings.

The task is rather artificial, lacking ecological validity.  However, the task is highly controlled, leading to high internal validity.  This means that a cause and effect relationship can be determined.

It is not possible to know that an actual "laundry schema" was active while listening to the text. There should be other reasons for the rate of recall - e.g. good memory skills.

The findings of the study have been applied successfully to education, helping students to improve reading skills and retention of information.