The Impact of Off-task and Gaming Behaviors on Learning: Immediate or Aggregate?

: Both gaming the system (taking advantage of the system’s feedback and help to succeed in the tutor without learning the material) and being off-task (engaging in behavior that does not involve the system or the learning task) have been previously shown to be associated with poorer learning. In this paper we investigate two hypotheses about the mechanisms that lead to this reduced learning: (a) less learning within individual steps (immediate harmful impact) and (b) overall learning loss due to fewer opportunities to practice (aggregate harmful impact). We show that gaming tends to have immediate harmful impact while off-task tends to have aggregated harmful impact on learning.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2009
• Where: AIED
• Authors: Mihaela Cocea, Arnon Hershkovitz, Ryan Shaun Joazeiro de Baker
• Keywords: Aggregate Harmful Impact, AIED 2009, Artificial Intelligence, Harmful Impact, Immediate Harmful Impact