Adaptive Guidance: Enhancing Self-Regulation, Knowledge, and Performance in Technology-Based Training

Bradford S. Bell, Cornell University
Steve W. J. Kozlowski, Michigan State University

Article comments

Suggested Citation
Bell, B. S. & Kozlowski, S. W. J. (2002). Adaptive guidance: Enhancing self-regulation, knowledge, and performance in technology-based training. Retrieved [insert date], from Cornell University, ILR School site: http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/articles/393/

Required Publisher Statement
Copyright by Wiley-Blackwell. Final version published as: Bell, B. S., & Kozlowski, S. W. J. (2002). Adaptive guidance: Enhancing self-regulation, knowledge, and performance in technology-based training. Personnel Psychology, 55(2), 267-306.

Abstract

Considerable research has examined the effects of giving trainees control over their learning (Steinberg, 1977, 1989; Williams, 1993). The most consistent finding of this research has been that trainees do not make good instructional use of the control they are given. Yet, today’s technologically based training systems often provide individuals with significant control over their learning (Brown, 2001). This creates a dilemma that must be addressed if technology is going to be used to create more effective training systems. The current study extended past research that has examined the effects of providing trainees with some form of advisement or guidance in addition to learner control and examined the impact of an instructional strategy, adaptive guidance, on learning and performance in a complex training environment. Overall, it was found that adaptive guidance had a substantial effect on the nature of trainees’ study and practice, self-regulation, knowledge acquired, and performance.