A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of - Queen Margaret University

3.2.1.4 Delayed recall
Approximately two weeks following the training procedure participants were
requested to participate for individual debriefings, the contents of which were not
discussed beforehand. All participants attended. During this meeting participants
were assessed on their ability to recall as much of the learned details as
possible, firstly with no visual cue and then with the image of the creatures
(spoken recall). Each participant then completed a multiple-choice task
consisting of each alien’s picture where they were required to choose one name
from a choice of three (the target word and two non-word distracters), skill from
a choice of three (the target skill and two other unusual skills) and also to colour
in the aliens’ eye colour (choice of five coloured pencils). This task made less
demands on participants and aimed to ascertain if participants could
demonstrate learning when provided with additional information even if they
were unable to recall the names and skills spontaneously. All spoken responses
were audio recorded. At least four days following the delayed recall session a
further task was employed to ascertain if participants had in fact learned the
names of the aliens or if the multiple-choice task simply reflected participant
ability to recognise the trained items. Participants were required to match a
picture of each alien with its correct name from a choice of three alien names
from the training session.
3.2.1.5 Qualitative information
During the delayed recall session participants responded to a number of
questions to inform the design of the main investigation. The questions
investigated perceived pressures experienced by participants, the role of context
in learning the information, clarity of instructions, the various modalities used to
train, for example, auditory information, use of pre-recorded versus face-to-face
interaction and the adequacy of the length of time given to complete the learning
tasks. A summary of responses is presented in Appendix 3.3.
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