Nancy Lincoln & Ira Fischler. Contextual interference and retrieval practice in retention of a novel cognitive skill
    Three experiments were conducted to investigate two different processing mechanisms of the contextual interference effect, which states that the larger the amount of interference from other items at the time of learning, the greater the subsequent long-term retention and transfer of the information that has been learned (Battig, 1972). Intraitem processing theories focus on the reconstruction of to-be-learned items from memory during acquisition, whereas interitem or relational processing theories focus on contrasts and comparisons between items during learning. Participants learned sets of unique or related Kanji characters mapped onto sequential mathematical rules in various practice schedules (random, blocked, blocked with an intervening task, and semi-random) and were then given a retention test 48 hours later. A strong contextual interference effect was found in all three experiments, extending the current literature to the higher-level learning of cognitive skills. Marginal effects of relational processing were found; but more interestingly, the claim that a blocked-plus-intervening-task schedule could replicate the demands and workload of a random schedule (Carlson and Yaure, 1990) was not supported. Furthermore, qualitative differences amongst groups that learned the rules one at a time, or in groups of two, three, or six, are discussed in terms of varying levels of proactive interference. Results are discussed in an intraitem processing framework, and theoretical explanations are adopted from the literature on the distribution of practice (e.g. deficient processing theories) to understand underlying processes of random and blocked practice schedules. However, more research is clearly needed on the relational aspects of contextual interference, and of skill learning in general.