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During learning, interleaving exemplars from different categories (e.g., ABCBCACAB) rather than blocking by category (e.g., AAABBBCCC) often enhances inductive learning, especially when the categories are highly similar. However, when allowed to select their own study schedules, learners overwhelmingly tend to block rather than interleave. Category similarity has been shown to moderate the relative benefit of interleaved versus blocked study. We investigated whether learners were sensitive to category similarity when choosing exemplars for study, and whether these choices predicted their learning outcomes. In Experiment 1, learners interleaved more often when the categories were highly similar (difficult to discriminate from each other), compared with when similarity was low. In Experiment 2, learners were presented with two sets of categories to learn; categories within each set were similar to each other, but categories were dissimilar across sets. When learners chose to interleave, they tended to switch to a similar rather than dissimilar category. Importantly, learners' study choices predicted their subsequent categorization performance. Our findings suggest that learners are strategic in their search for commonalities within versus differences among categories and can regulate their study behaviors based on category similarity.

If multiple opportunities are available to review to-be-learned material, should a review occur soon after initial study and recur at progressively expanding intervals, or should the reviews occur at equal intervals? Landauer and Bjork (1978) argued for the superiority of expanding intervals, whereas more recent research has often failed to find any advantage. However, these prior studies have generally compared expanding versus equal-interval training within a single session, and have assessed effects only upon a single final test. We argue that a more generally important goal would be to maintain high average performance over a considerable period of training. For the learning of foreign vocabulary spread over four weeks, we found that expanding retrieval practice (i.e., sessions separated by increasing numbers of days) produced recall equivalent to that from equal-interval practice on a final test given eight weeks after training. However, the expanding schedule yielded much higher average recallability over the whole training period.

Reviewing information stored in memory will generally strengthen that information, so it seems reasonable that reviews should make it harder to replace the information in memory if it is later found to be erroneous. In Experiment 1, subjects learned three facts about each of 12 topics. On Day 2, the same facts were either reread, tested, or not reviewed; then the facts were "corrected" with new replacement facts. A test on the replacement facts given 1week later disclosed that both rereading and testing the to-be-replaced Day-1 facts enhanced memory for the Day-2 facts which supplanted them, although rereading (but not testing) the Day-1 facts also led to more intrusions of Day-1 facts on the final test. In Experiment 2, subjects were unexpectedly asked (in the final test) to recollect both original and replacement facts; old facts were often retrieved, especially when reviewed. It is suggested that review may promote development of a secondary retrieval route for the corrected information., (Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Is learning of a complex functional relationship enhanced by trying to predict what output will go with a given input, as compared to studying an input-output pair? We examined learning of a bilinear function and transfer to new items outside the trained range. Subjects either saw the input-output pairs (study-only condition) or attempted to guess the output and then saw the pair (test/study condition). The total study times were equated, and motivation was enhanced with a monetary bonus. Performance was markedly better for the test/study condition, both within the trained range and in the transfer test. This benefit of testing during training was observed on a criterial test administered shortly after training. Testing has long been shown to enhance the explicit learning and retention of verbal material; our present findings reveal a novel domain for which testing can also be advantageous-that is, function learning.