Lecture 9

Complex Learning and Cognition

Transfer & Problem Solving
Complex Learning and Cognition
Transfer
Problem solving
Critical thinking
Transfer
Apply information and skills learnt in one situatio
n to another
Generalization in behavioral model
Types of transfer: declarative knowledge, procedu

ral knowledge
Declarative vs Procedural Knowledge
Do you still remember what they are?
What kind(s) of knowledge is(are) involved in the tran
sfer below:
Example 1: your skill in throwing a baseball helps you
case a fishing line.
Example 2: your knowledge of the grammatical struct
ure of French helps you make sense of the language s
ystem in German
Example 3: your understanding of the base-10 numbe
r system helps you borrow in subtraction problems
 Transfer can involve declarative knowledge, proce
dural knowledge, or an interplay between the two
Other Types of Transfer
Positive vs Negative Transfer
Vertical vs Lateral Transfer
Near vs Far Transfer
Specific vs General Transfer
Positive vs Negative
Positive Transfer occurs when learning in one situ
ation facilitates learning or performance in anoth
er situation
E.g., learning the motivation theories in this cours

e helps you to devise some strategies to arouse y

our students motivation to learn and keep them
on task in classroom
Positive vs Negative
Negative Transfer occurs when learning in one sit
uation hinders a persons ability to learn or perfo
rm in another situation
E.g., Learning and practising your mother tongue

from early on causes you difficulty to acquire a se

cond-language with a native accent.
Negative Transfer
Inappropriate transfer of what you have learnt:

E.g., cook, cooked, cooked

look, looked, looked
go, goed, goed!!!!!

E.g.,
Vertical vs Lateral
Vertical transfer occurs when learning in one do
main is a prerequisite of learning in another.
E.g., addition multiplication; integers decim

als and fractions

Lateral transfer occurs when learning in one dom

ain can help learning in another, but the former i

s not a MUST
E.g., knowledge in French helps learning in Spanis

h
Near vs Far
Near transfer involves situations or problems tha
t are similar in both superficial characteristics an
d underlying relationships.
Far transfer involves situations or problems that s

hare similar underlying relationships but differen

t surface characteristics
Specific vs General
Specific transfer occurs when the original learnin
g task and the transfer task overlap in some way.
(Consider near and far transfer)
General transfer occurs when the two tasks are di

fferent in both content and structure.

E.g., learning habits acquired in a physics course f

acilitate the learning of sociology

Look at the two examples below. Do they illustrate g
eneral or specific transfer? Explain.

1. You are comfortable at the keyboard on your desk-top computer. Later, you bu
y a laptop, and you become comfortable using its keyboard. Does this illustrate g
eneral or specific transfer?

2. You enjoy chess and have studied and worked a great deal to improve your ga
me. Sometime later you believe you better understand mathematics because thi
nking is involved in both activities.
Summary
Knowledge is transferrable in many different way
s.
Good or bad
Transfer: a process that we make sense of a new l

earning situation based on our existing ones whe

n the two situations share some commonalities.
Sometimes it works.
Theories of Transfer
Historical perspective: formal discipline, mind-as-
muscle
Behavioral perspective: similarity of stimuli and/o

r responses
Cognitive perspective: whether learners retrieve

what they have previously learnt at a time when i

t might be useful
Contextual perspective: context
Historical perspective
Formal discipline:
the notion that learning in one situation improves learning and
performance in another situation regardless of how different th
e two situations might be.
Learning rigorous and demanding subject matter facilitates all f
uture tasks because it disciplines and strengths the mind.
Analogy: you exercise your muscles to develop strength; y
ou exercise your mind to learn more quickly and deal with
new situations more effectively (mind-as-muscle idea)
In the old days, scholars studies difficult topics (e.g., Latin,
classical Greek) believing that knowledge in those topics c
an be transferred to all kinds of learning situations
Behavioral perspective
Thorndikes Identical Elements
Transfer occurs when the original and transfer ta

sks have identical elements

Same specific stimulus-response association
Thorndikes study:

Arithmetic achievement was correlated with performanc

e in a bookkeeping course but not Latin proficiency
Behavioral perspective
Later views: focus on how transfer is affected by s
timulus and response characteristics in both the
original and transfer situations
List 1 List 2 List 3 List 4
Lamp-shoe Lamp-sock Rain-shoe Lamp-goat
Boat-fork Boat-spoon Bear-fork Boat-shop
Wall-lawn Wall-yard Sofa-lawn Wall-rice
Corn-road Corn-lane Book-road Corn-fish

Will learning in List 1 help you to learn List

2?
Will learning in List 1 help you to learn List

3?
Will learning in List 1 help you to learn List

4?
Three Principles
1. Stimuli and responses are similar in the two situ
ations: maximal positive transfer
2. Stimuli are different but responses are similar:
some positive transfer
3. Stimuli are similar but responses are different:
negative transfer

. E.g., for 1 and 2: same response of cutting and

pasting in spreadsheets and emails
. E.g., for 3: red means stop for pedestrian but
go for driver
Cognitive perspective
Key question: whether learners retrieve what the
y have previously learnt at a time when it might b
e useful
Both current situation and prior knowledge in wo

rking memory simultaneously

Barrier to transfer: limited capacity of working m

emory, retrieval failure

To increase the chance of transfer: retrieval cues
Contextual perspective
Context specific: situated in the environment in w
hich it takes place
Situated learning
Transfer occurs in new contexts which are similar

to the original one

Factors affecting transfer
Meaningful learning promotes better transfer tha
n rote learning
Thorough learning promotes better transfer
High similarity between situations promotes bett

er transfer
General principles and rules are easily transferre

d than specific facts and information

Factors affecting transfer
Numerous and varied examples and opportunitie
s for practice promotes better transfer
Increased time interval between the original and

transfer tasks reduces the probability of transfer

Transfer increases when the cultural environment

encourages and expects transfer

Problem Solving
A form of transfer
Existing knowledge is used to answer questions o

r solve troubling situation

Well-defined vs ill-defined problems
Well-defined: a problem with clear goal, only one
correct solution and a certain method for finding
it
E.g., math problem
Ill-defined: a problem that has an ambiguous goa

l, more than one acceptable solution, and no gen

erally agreed-upon strategy for reaching a solutio
n
E.g., poor relationship with your partner
Challenge to teachers
Most problems student solve in classrooms are W
ELL-defined;
But the problems they will encounter in everyday

lives outside of school are ILL-defined.

Theories of problem-solving
Behavioral perspective: trial-and-error learning
Cognitive perspective: information processing mo

del, including working memory, encoding, retriev

al, prior knowledge base and metacognition
Behavioral perspective
Trial and error, without foreseeing the potential o
utcomes
If 16a + 17a a2 =186, then a=?

A. 2 B. 3 C. 4 D. 5 E. 6
Cognitive perspective
Factors in problem solving

Working memory: for holding information while t

hinking
Limited capacity
Solution: write down the problem, write out the s

teps, rote learning some skills (e.g., simple numb

er rules in calculation)
Cognitive perspective
Encoding
Accuracy
A classic childrens riddle:
As I was going to St. Ives,
I met a man with seven wives.
Every wife had seven sacks.
Every sack had seven cats.
Every cat had seven kits.
Kits, cats, sacks, wives.
How many were going to St. Ives?
Cognitive perspective
Mental sets in encoding: people are often predisp
osed to approach and encode problems in partic
ular ways

Question: how can you throw a tennis ball so that

it goes a short distance, comes to a complete sto
p, the reverses its direction? You may not bounce
the ball against a surface, nor may you attach any
other object (such as a string) to it.
The Candle Problem

Given a book of matches, a box of thumbtacks, and a candle,

how can you fix the candle to the wall so that its wax wont d
rip onto the table below?

(Youtube)

Adopted from http://www.futilitycloset.com/2012/04/19/the-candle-problem/

Retrieval from long-term memory
To retrieval previously acquired knowledge to sol
ve a problem
Anxiety interferes with memory retrieval
The value of incubation in long-term memory retr

ieval esp. in difficult situation:

To allow factors that interfere with problem solving (e.g.
, fatigue, anxiety, counterproductive mental sets) to diss
ipate during the incubation period.
Do you have similar experience?
Knowledge base
More complete and better organized knowledge
base for a problem helps one to solve it.
Metacognition
Successful problem solvers must:
Believe that they are capable of solving the problem
Realize that some problems may take considerable time
and effort to accomplish
Plan a general course of action
Flexibly consider potentially relevant problem-solving st
rategies and choose appropriate ones
Monitor progress towards a solution and change strateg
ies if necessary
Common beliefs among students
Successful problem solving is largely a matter of l
uck
A problem can have only one answer
There is only way to solve any particular problem
A problem is either solvable within a few minutes

time or else not solvable at all

Problem-solving strategies
Specific algorithms, procedures that guarantee co
rrect solutions

E.g., mathematical formula, steps for operating a

machine
Problem-solving strategies
General heuristics, approaches without guarante
ed outcomes
Brainstorming general a large number of possible sol
utions
Means-ends analysis:
. One breaks a problem into sub-problems and tackle them o
ne by one
Problem-solving strategies (contd)
General heuristics
Working backward
. Solving algebra
Using visual imagery
. Use of visuospatial sketchpad for representing the problem
visually
Drawing analogy
. Learned from worked problem / example
Steps in problem solving
1. Identify the problem goal
2. Represent the problem (e.g., in a diagram)
3. Select a strategy
4. Implement it
5. Evaluate the results
Promotion of Transfer and Problem-s
olving
Students should learn information thoroughly an
d meaningfully
Students should learn problem solving strategies

in a meaningful manner
Discovery activities and expository instruction bot

h play important roles in learning problem solvin

g skills
Students should have a mental set for transfer
 Some prerequisites should be practiced until they
are learned to the level of automaticity
Practice doesnt necessarily make perfect, but it d

oes increase the probability of successful transfer

and problem solving
Students should have experience identifying the

problems for themselves

To minimize negative transfer, differences betwee

n two ideas should be emphasized

 Instruction in general problem solving skills (both
cognitive and metacognitive) can be helpful
Students should learn strategies for defining ill-d

efined problems
Students early attempts to solve difficult proble

ms should be scaffolded
The development of effective problem solving str

ategies can be facilitated through cooperative gro

up problem solving
 Authentic activities can increase the probability t
hat students will transfer knowledge, skills and pr
oblem solving strategies to the real world context
s
Classroom assessment practices should include

measures of transfer and problem solving

Recap Exercise
Write down 4 5 key concepts covered in this lecture (w
ith some elaborations) and share with the friend sitting
next to you!

1.

2.

3.

4.
References:
Eggen, P. D. & Kauchak, D. P. (2014). Educational p
sychology: Windows on classrooms (9th ed.). Uppe
r Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Merrill.
Ormrod, J. E. (2012). Human learning (6th ed.). NJ:

Pearson.