THE IMPACT OF GOAL SPECIFICITY ON STRATEGY USE AND THE ACQUISITION OFPROBLEM STRUCTURE

Theories of skill acquisition have made radically different prediction s about the role of general problem-solving methods in acquiring rules that promote effective transfer to new problems. Under one view, meth ods that focus on reaching specific goals, such as means-ends analysis , ore assumed to provide the basis for efficient knowledge compilation (Anderson, 1987), whereas under an alternative view such methods are believed to disrupt rule induction (Sweller. 1988). We suggest that th e role of general methods in learning varies with both the specificity of the problem solver's goal and the systematicity of the strategies used for testing hypotheses about rules. In the absence of a specific goal people are more likely to use a rule-induction learning strategy, whereas provision of a specific goal fosters use of difference reduct ion, which tends to be a non rule-induction strategy. We performed two experiments to investigate the impact of goal specificity and systema ticity of rule-induction strategies in learning and transfer within a complex dynamic system. The results of Experiment 1 indicated that dur ing free exploration of a problem space, greater learning occurred if participants adopted more systematic strategies for rule induction, an d that participants come to favor such strategies. Experiment 2 reveal ed that participants who were provided with a specific goal performed well on the initial problem but were impaired on a transfer test using a similar problem with a different goal. instruction on a systematic rule-induction strategy facilitated solution for both the initial and transfer problems, but participants' use of this strategy declined if they had a specific goal. Our results support Sweller's (1988) proposa l that general problem-solving methods applied to a specific goal fost er acquisition of knowledge about an isolated solution path but do not provide on effective way of learning the overall structure of a probl em space. We interpret these results in terms of dual-space theories o f search through problem space.