The Effects of Massed Practice and Distributive Practice on Motor Skill Task.

Queens College/ City University of New York

Over a century scientist have wonder if massed practice conditions are superior to distributive practice conditions or visa versa. According to a mete-analytic review scientists have researched this very phenomenon and have concluded that distributive practices conditions are superior to those of massed practice conditions in a variety of situations. These results are supported by Maureen Bergondy's experiment on team practice schedules as well as William C. Chasey's experiment on distribution of practice on learning retention and relearning. This experiment deals with the relationship between conditions of massed practice and distributive practice with respect to task performance. The motor skill task performed by subjects in this study wrote the English alphabet upside down fifty times. One group was given the massed practice motor task; while subjects from the five other groups practiced the motor task under five different distributions of time. However, our findings do not support those of previous finding

Figure 1. Main Effect of Conditions (Rest Periods).

Before they started the experiment participants were told to have a pen or pencil with several sheets of paper to conduct the experiment. They were instructed to begin writing the English alphabet upside down from the right to left on the paper when told and to stop when told. Please refer to table 1for an illustration. However they had to start were they left off at the previous trial. If they did make mistakes, they were told not to correct them. At the end of the experiment when all the raw data was collected there was a factorial ANOVA done to determine the main effects if there was one and interaction.

There were no significant differences found in the number of letters correctly printed between the 60 levels of the two independent variables. Our findings do not support those of previous finding. Table 2 reports the factorial-measures ANOVA (N=51) since there was more than one condition. Please refer to this table for the M. There was a main effect for trials F (9,27) = 14.83 p*0.001, but no effect for rest period the was F (5,45) = 1.253 p*0.301. There was also no significant interaction of trials by rest period of F (45,205)=0.902 p*0.65. Graph 1 illustrates the main effect of conditions (rest periods). Graph 2 illustrates the main effect trials. Graph 3 illustrates the interaction between them.

Mean of Letters Correctly Printed.

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Approximate Word count = 1839
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)