EFFECTS OF PRACTICING SELF-MONITORING OF MATHEMATICAL PROBLEM-SOLVINGHEURISTICS ON IMPULSIVE AND REFLECTIVE COLLEGE-STUDENTS HEURISTICS KNOWLEDGE AND PROBLEM-SOLVING ABILITY

The authors designed a step-by-step self-monitoring method to help imp ulsive students overcome their unwillingness to self-monitor. They pre dicted (a) that self-monitoring in general would help student learning of the heuristics of solving mathematical problems, (b) that self-mon itoring would be more helpful for the impulsive students than for the reflective students, and (c) that step-by-step self-monitoring would b e more helpful for the impulsive students than an external reminder th at provided cues for general self-monitoring, The first 2 predictions were supported by the results of the study. As for the 3rd prediction, general self-monitoring was found to be more beneficial than step-by- step self-monitoring for the impulsive students. The findings are disc ussed in terms of competition for cognitive resources between learning and self-monitoring.