Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

About the PNAS Member Editor
Name Bjork, Robert A.
Location University of California, Los Angeles
Primary Field Psychological and Cognitive Sciences
 Research Interests
Robert Bjork's research focuses on how people learn and remember, versus how people think they learn and remember, and the implication of that research for upgrading teaching and self-regulated learning. Research from his laboratory has demonstrated that people often assume that human memory works in ways similar to recording devices-such the memory in a computer-whereas human learning processes differ from such devices in truly fundamental ways. Conditions that promote forgetting and impair performance during instruction and practice, for example, can actually enhance long-term retention and transfer. Conversely, conditions that retard forgetting and enhance performance during training frequently fail to support long-term training retention and transfer. From a theoretical standpoint, such findings have implications for the functional architecture of humans as learners. From a practical standpoint, they point to reasons instructors are susceptible to choosing less-effective conditions of instruction over more effective conditions; why learners are prone to illusions of competence; and why real-world instruction and practice are seldom as effective as they might be.

 
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