INSTRUCTIONAL ANALOGIES AND THE LEARNING OF CONCEPTS

This paper describes two studies which were designed to examine the ef fect of instructional analogy training on the ability to identify the application of 10 advanced physiological concepts. In the first study, 161 college students received instruction either with or without anal ogies. Levels of student performances were compared across three condi tions: (a) concept lessons only (including definitions and examples fo r each concept), (b) similar concept lessons but with an analogy inclu ded for each concept, and (c) analogy concept lessons with additional prompts guiding analogy use. In the second study, immediate and delaye d performance of 94 college students was compared between groups recei ving concept lessons with and without analogies. Results showed signif icantly higher scores, both immediately and after the delayed period, for those students who had received the analogies. Results are discuss ed in terms of the prescriptive use of analogies within instructional materials and future research possibilities.