Note-taking and passage style

Abstract

High-formality and low-formality versions of a passage were read by 120 undergraduate education students who either took notes for a presentation to professionals or to students, or simply read the text. A free-recall test showed superiority for notetakers and for those reading low-formality text. Despite passage style and type of instruction, Ss took essentially verbatim notes, but in recall, informal material was paraphrased significantly more than formal prose. A conditional probability analysis showed that an idea unit was more likely to be recalled if it had been written in notes than if it had only been read. Results support the encoding function of note-taking and its relation to informal prose. (13 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

Full text

Journal
of
Educational
Psychology
1981,
Vol.
73,
No.
2,242-250
Copyright
1981
by the
American
Psychological
Association, Inc.
(K)22-Ofi6.VHI/7302-0242$00.7S
Note-Taking
and
Passage Style
Burke
H.
Bretzing
and
Raymond
W.
Kulhavy
Arizona
State
University
High-formality
and
low-formality
versions
of a
passage
were
read
by
under-
graduate
education students
who
either took notes
for a
presentation
to
pro-
fessionals
or to
students,
or
simply
read
the
text.
A
free-recall
test
showed
su-
periority
for
notetakers
and for
those
reading
low-formality
text.
Despite
passage
style
and
type
of
instruction,
individuals
took
essentially
verbatim
notes,
but in
recall,
informal
material
was
paraphrased
significantly
more
than
formal
prose.
A
conditional
probability
analysis
showed
that
an
idea
unit
was
more
likely
to be
recalled
if
it,
had
been
written
in
notes
than
if it had
only
been
read.
These
results
support
the
encoding
function
of
note-taking
and its
rela-
tion
to
informal
prose.
Much
of the
research
on
note-taking
be-
havior
has
centered
on
questions about what
people
remember
from
the
notes themselves
(Bretzing
&
Kulhavy, 1979;
Hartley
&
Davies,
1978). Although such questions
are
important
ones,
we
believe
that
an
effective
analysis
of
note-taking activity must involve
some
differential predictions relating notes
to
both
the
style
and
interpretation
of the
target
information.
In
written instruction, passage style
is
probably
an
important variable
for
deter-
mining
the
content,
of
notes
and the
degree
to
which
a
student
is
able
to use the
notes
to
increase recall.
In the
present study,
we
chose
to
study passages containing essen-
tially
the
same information,
but
written
at
opposite ends
of a
continuum
we
have
la-
beled
formality.
Here,
the
term
formality
refers
to the
same type
of
separation Spiro
(1977)
attempted
to
make when
he
discussed
the
idea
of
integrity
in
prose structure.
Al-
though
our
definitions
are
similar
to
those
of
Spiro,
we
chose
the
formality label because
it is
easier
to
comprehend
for
most people,
and it
also made
our
task
of
instructing
passage
raters
a
simpler
one.
The
pivot
of
our
definition
is the
degree
to
which
new
information
can be
made
to
relate
to
com-
munity
values
of
prior knowledge.
An in-
formal
passage would
be
written
to
allow
maximum
contact
with general information
available
to all or
most readers
in a
given
Requests
for
reprints
should
be
sent
to
Burke
H.
Bretzing,
Department
of
Educational
Psychology,
Ar-
izona
State
University,
Tempe,
Arizona
85281.
subject
population.
For
example,
a
low-
formality
passage would
be
designed
for
communication with learners
who
were well
acquainted with
the
terminology
and ex-
amples used
in the
text.
On the
other hand,
a
highly formal
passage
is
written
to
maxi-
mize
structured communication with
as few
personally identified instances
as
possible.
We
hypothesized
that
both
the
type
and
content
of
notes would vary
as a
function
of
the
formality built into
the
passage.
Our
second variable involved manipulat-
ing
task
demands prior
to the
note-taking-
reading
activity.
Pichert
and
Anderson
(1977)
showed
that
the
perspective
em-
ployed during reading determines
the
con-
tent
of
recall.
When subjects read material
from
a
particular viewpoint, subsequent
re-
call
was
biased.
Thus,
different
schemata
may
be
tapped, resulting
in
altered inter-
pretations
of
text.
We
asked students
to
take
notes designed
to
prepare
them
to ei-
ther deliver
a
lecture
to a
group
of
high
school
students
or to an
assembly
of
profes-
sionals
who
were
familiar
with
the
con-
tent—thus
viewing
the
passage
from
a
dif-
ferent
perspective.
Obviously,
we are
pri-
marily
interested
in the
interaction between
passage style
and
note-taking instructions.
It
seems reasonable
to
argue
that
a
combi-
nation such
as
high formality
and
profes-
sional
orientation
should lead
to
greater
verbatim production,
a
more rigid note-
taking
style,
and
lower overall recall because
of
the
tighter demands
of the
formal/pro-
fessional
mode. Alternately, those learners
who
receive
a
low-formal, student-oriented
treatment seem more
likely
to
produce
a