Instructional compensation for age-related cognitive declines: Effects of goal specificity in maze learning.
Open accessAbstract
The differential effects of goal specificity on maze learning among 40 young adults and 40 old adults were investigated. Participants had to navigate through a computerized training-maze task. The finish point of the maze could be presented either as a specific location or in more general terms. After solving the maze problem, participants were required to solve the same problem again, either by moving from start to finish or backward from finish to start. The hypotheses that the presence or absence of a specific goal would disproportionately compromise or enhance, respectively, elderly people's performance were confirmed. Although young adults outperformed old participants in all conditions, these differences were much smaller in the nonspecific goal conditions. These results suggest that instruction based on cognitive load theory (J, Sweller, J.J.G, Van Merrienboer, & F. Paas, 1998) can compensate for age-related cognitive declines.
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Goal-free tasks eliminate the need for means-ends search and so decrease extraneous cognitive load.
“Goal-free tasks present the learner with a highly aspecific goal, which eliminates the need for means-ends search and so decreases extraneous cognitive load (Paas, Camp, & Rikers, 2001; also see Sweller et al., 1998, for an overview).”
From Taking the Load Off a Learner's Mind: Instructional Design for Complex Learning (2003) · cites this paper as Paas, Camp, & Rikers, 2001
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- Authors
- Paas, F., Camp, G., & Rikers, R.
- Venue
- Journal of Educational Psychology
- Published
- 2001-03
- Volume
- 93
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 181-186
- ISSN
- 0022-0663 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-2176
- OpenAlex
- W2149642123
- Cited by
- 87
- References
- 9
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 1 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 2 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 7 · 2017: 1 · 2016: 4 · 2015: 6 · 2014: 7 · 2013: 3 · 2012: 5
- FWCI
- 4.50
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- dspace.library.uu.nl
- Licence
- other-oa
- Locations
- Journal of Educational Psychology (publishedVersion)
- EUR Research Repository (Erasmus University Rotterdam) (publishedVersion)
- EUR Research Repository (Erasmus University Rotterdam) (submittedVersion)
- Utrecht University Repository (Utrecht University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- DSpace (Open University in the Netherlands) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Visual and Cognitive Learning Processes
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Cognitive Functions and Memory
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Neuropsychology and Physiological Psychology › Aging and Gerontology Research
- Keywords
- age-related cognitive decline, goal specificity, maze learning, spatial navigation, cognitive load theory, older adults
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