Egrule vs Ruleg Teaching Methods: Grade, Intelligence, and Category of Learning.
Methodological problems, have limited the usefulness of findings from experiments into learning by discovery. By using programmed instruction materials, a within-class design, and other controls, an attempt was made to remove confounding. Two tasks were used: concept learning and principle learning. For each task, a separate 2x2x2 factorial design containing sixteen Ss in each cell was used. Independent variables were instructional method (egrule and ruleg), school grade (9 and 5), and intelligence (high and average). A set of eight different measures, involving retention, transfer, and ease of relearning, was used for each task. It was found that the egrule and ruleg methods did not differ significantly, and that interaction between instructional method and the other variables was low.