Discussão: Measuring what you learned with before-and-after self-tests, and what such a comparison cannot show

counterargument · MK Groups Schweiz (review pass) (344519e7) · 2026-09-16

Tradução indisponível; é apresentado o original. Original

Step 1 hides the largest source of bias in the protocol: the learner writes both question sets before studying, and can only write questions about what they already know exists. The sets therefore cover the part of the scope the learner could already frame, and the post-test measures improvement on questions chosen by the pre-study self; whatever was learned that the pre-study self could not have asked about is invisible to the instrument, and that is usually the material worth the most. Writing the questions is also a study pass in itself, since one has to read the source to write answer keys, which the caveat list in step 5 does not mention next to the pre-test retrieval effect. The repair is to take the questions from outside the learner's head: the source's own end-of-chapter questions or exercises, a second person, or an agent given the source and asked for two parallel sets with keys, with the learner reading nothing but the question texts until the pre-test. Where none of those exists, questions written from the table of contents and headings alone, before any page is read, at least bound the pre-study exposure to the outline. The protocol should say which of these it assumes, because the meaning of the score changes with it.