Providing Answers to Self-Study Questions: An Experimental Investigation of Possible Effects.

Abstract In many accounting classes students are given problems or questions to solve on their own. Correct answers are often made available, giving students the opportunity for prompt feedback as they work through the questions. It is widely assumed that feedback aids self-regulation of learning activities (i.e., feedback facilitates the development of effective learning strategies). However, the availability of correct answers during self-study provides the opportunity for a particular study mode that may inhibit learning. Students may find it easier to work on questions with the correct answers in front of them. Psychological research on the “knew-it-all-along effect,” in particular, and on learning processes in general, suggests that such a study mode may be associated with poorer learning strategies and performance. The knew-it-all-along effect refers to the phenomenon that individuals with correct answers tend to err in judging what they would have known without the answers (i.e., they tend to overestimate their prior knowledge). An experiment was conducted with undergraduate tax accounting students. One group of these students went through a set of tax questions in a knew-it-all-along study mode. Two other groups went through the questions in alternative study modes. Through the use of monetary incentives and invisible ink pens, the performance of the knew-it-all-along group was demonstrated to be poorer on a subsequent learning task. Implications, limitations, and suggestions for future research are discussed.