TY - JOUR
T1 - Distributed Practice and Interleaved Practice
T2 - Undergraduate Students' Strategies, Experiences, and Beliefs
AU - Pan, Steven C.
AU - González-Cabañes, Eduardo
AU - Teo, Andy Z.J.
AU - Zung, Inez
AU - Sana, Faria
AU - Cooke, James E.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2025 The Author(s). Applied Cognitive Psychology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
PY - 2025/5/1
Y1 - 2025/5/1
N2 - Do undergraduate students know and use distributed practice, the strategy of spacing apart learning opportunities over time, and interleaved practice, the strategy of alternating between topics during learning? What beliefs do students hold about how learning should be scheduled, and how are common learning activities—such as using flashcards and completing problem sets—actually scheduled? To explore these questions, we surveyed students at two major universities in North America and Southeast Asia, respectively. We found that distributed practice is unfamiliar to many students, whereas interleaved practice is virtually unknown. Both strategies are often underutilized and perceived with mixed effectiveness. Instructors, meanwhile, reportedly use various scheduling approaches in lectures and assignments. Additionally, distributed practice was associated with better academic performance. These findings, which showed relative consistency across culturally diverse samples, underscore significant gaps in student awareness and adoption of distributed and interleaved practice, highlighting the need to improve their integration into educational settings.
AB - Do undergraduate students know and use distributed practice, the strategy of spacing apart learning opportunities over time, and interleaved practice, the strategy of alternating between topics during learning? What beliefs do students hold about how learning should be scheduled, and how are common learning activities—such as using flashcards and completing problem sets—actually scheduled? To explore these questions, we surveyed students at two major universities in North America and Southeast Asia, respectively. We found that distributed practice is unfamiliar to many students, whereas interleaved practice is virtually unknown. Both strategies are often underutilized and perceived with mixed effectiveness. Instructors, meanwhile, reportedly use various scheduling approaches in lectures and assignments. Additionally, distributed practice was associated with better academic performance. These findings, which showed relative consistency across culturally diverse samples, underscore significant gaps in student awareness and adoption of distributed and interleaved practice, highlighting the need to improve their integration into educational settings.
KW - distributed or spaced practice
KW - interleaved practice
KW - metacognition
KW - survey
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=105005994261&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1002/acp.70071
DO - 10.1002/acp.70071
M3 - Journal Article
AN - SCOPUS:105005994261
SN - 0888-4080
VL - 39
JO - Applied Cognitive Psychology
JF - Applied Cognitive Psychology
IS - 3
M1 - e70071
ER -