The relationship between learning methods and academic achievement in 10-year-old boys

The relationship between students' learning methods and their academic achievement was examined in this study. The 48 subjects used in this study were divided into four different groupings on the basis of their academic achievement. The first grouping was made on the basis of teacher ratings of performance in reading and arithmetic, and the remaining groupings were based on achievement test scores in reading and arithmetic.

A series of discrimination problems were posed to each of the 10-year-old male subjects using a method adapted from that used with college students by Levine, Miller, and Steinmeyer (1967). Up to 60 cards were shown to each subject; each card contained three shapes, and each shape was positioned randomly in one of three locations on the card and colored randomly with one of three colors. There was a total of nine discriminants. Each subject was given two practice problems, followed by four problems on which outcome feedback was provided on every third trial. Data were analyzed for the number of problems completed, the number of trials to completion, three-trial units, two-trial units, and for relationships among the dependent variables.

The findings included no support for a relationship between hypothesis-testing strategies and academic achievement groupings. However, there was a relationship between arithmetic achievement test scores and the number of problems completed, and there was an overall population tendency for hypothesis-sampling to be correlated negatively with the number of trials required to complete a problem.