Test-Enhanced Learning: Taking Memory Tests Improves Long-Term Retention
We checked this card's citation and the finding we state against the source's own page or record in October 2026.
What it found
Students who took recall tests on a passage, without feedback, remembered much more of it two days and a week later than students who spent the same time rereading it. Rereading won on a test five minutes later, and it made students more confident, even though it helped them less over time.
What kind of study it is
- Design
- Lab experiment
- Weight
- A lab or small classroom experiment: rigorous, but too small or too short to count as a school trial.
- Sample
- Two experiments with students reading prose passages
- Who
- College students
- Limits
- College students in a lab, short prose passages. It shows the effect clearly; it doesn't show how it plays out in a school year.
Read it
doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2006.01693.x
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Cited in the Library
Cite this study
Roediger, H. L., & Karpicke, J. D. (2006). Test-enhanced learning: Taking memory tests improves long-term retention. Psychological Science, 17(3), 249–255. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2006.01693.x
Checked against the source in October 2026. All studies · How we rate the evidence · Something wrong? Tell us.