THE SELF-EXPLNATION EFFECT 1

Examining self-explanation as an effective instructional strategy

Sylvia Chaiyeon Lee

University of San Francisco

THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 2

Examining self-explanation as an effective instructional strategy

As a learning strategy, self-explanation refers to the process of explaining materials to

oneself. It is a self-generated and self-directed constructive activity which requires analysis and

reflection of the underlying principles of one’s action (Roy & Chi, 2005). The self-explanation

effect states that learning is improved when students generate self-explanations about how and

why events or phenomena happen (Chi, Bassok, Lewis, Reimann & Glaser,1989; Segler, 2002).

According to US Next Generation Science Standards (as cited in Villalta-Cerdas & Sandi-

Urena, 2014), the generation of explanations is one of eight practices of science essential for all

students to learn along with analyzing data and engaging in argument.

Why is the ability to generate self-explanation important? There have been exciting

discoveries regarding why students learn better when they explain to themselves the material

they are learning. First, self-explanation requires students to elaborate on the to-be-learned

information by relating it to prior knowledge and construct new knowledge beyond the learning

materials (Fonseca & Chi, 2011). Simply put, learning is about integrating new information into

existing knowledge. And generating self-explanations facilitates that integration process. In

addition, the process of generating self-explanation encourages students to engage with the

learning material in a meaningful way (Roy & Chi, 2005; VanLehn, Jones & Chi, 1992). By

actively searching for explanations of the learning materials, students are more likely to go

deeper into the learning process and develop a better understanding of the material they study.

Lastly, the act of self-explaining requires students to be aware of the learning and comprehension

process and thus, influences metacognition (Roy & Chi, 2005; McNamara & Magliano, 2009).
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 3

Overall, the findings of these studies suggest that implementing self-explanation in instruction

leads to enhanced learning, more accurate self-assessments, and more effective problem-solving.

What are the theoretical explanations for the self-explanation effect? Roy and Chi (2005)

explain that self-explanation is involved with several cognitive processes which help students

learn better including generating inferences, integrating information, and monitoring and

repairing the learner’s flawed mental model. Similarly, VanLehn and Jones (1993) also view

gap-filling, schema acquisition and enhanced analogical problem solving as the major

contributing factors of the self-explanation effect. Then, Siegler (2002) suggests self-explanation

is effective because self-explaining encourages students to focus their attention on their

incomprehension and effective strategies, as well as increases motivation. Finally, Lombrozo

(2012) claims that self-explaining guides students to look for repeated and unifying patterns, thus

discovering broader generalizations. Across studies, at least the gap-filling and generation of

inferences appear to account for the self-explanation effect. The rationale for gap-filling and

generation of inferences is that self-explanation causes students to discover their gaps in their

knowledge and do something about it; in the process of producing self-explanations, students are

inferring information missing from a text passage or an example’s solution using skills such as

analytical reasoning and critical thinking (Villalta-Cerdas & Sandi-Urena, 2014).

The self-explanation effect is tested in a wide variety of domains from physics problem-

solving (Chi et al.,1989) to geometry (Aleven & Koedinger, 2002) and reading comprehension

(McNamara& Magliano, 2009). Across studies, the general findings demonstrate the benefits of

the self-explanation effect on learning and problem-solving. However, it remains an open

question how many classroom teachers are aware of the benefits of self-explanation as a learning

strategy and implement it to everyday instruction. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is not only
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to identify the advantages of self-explanation, but also to promote the use of self-explaining as an

instructional strategy. Self-explanation needs to be recognized by more educators as an

experimentally supported instructional method that can help teachers create more student-

centered and more interactive classroom atmosphere.

To further explore the potential of self-explanation as a superior instructional strategy in

a wide range of educational settings, I reviewed two studies. These studies investigate the effects

of self-explanation in different domains, contexts and learners. I chose these two articles because

they are idiosyncratic in terms of perspectives, research methods and designs. The first study by

Wylie, Koedinger and Mitamura (2010) tested the self-explanation effect in second language

grammar acquisition in a computer-based learning environment. Most of the studies on the self-

explanation effect are conducted on the math and science domains like geometry (Aleven &

Koedinger, 2002), biology (Chi, De Leeuw, Chiu & LaVancher, 1994), and physics (Chi et al.,

1989). Therefore, this study is unique in evaluating the self-explanation effect within the context

of learning the English article system. The results of this study are informative for me as an

English as a Second Language (ESL) instructor, who wants to help students improve their

grammatical skills.

In the second study by Villalta-Cerdas and Sandi-Urena (2014), the researchers continue

to examine the self-explanation effect but in the context of real college chemistry learning

environments. This study is unique in addressing whether different self-explaining tasks impact

the student self-explaining behavior and assessing how different levels of engagement in self-

explaining influence learning chemistry concepts. Especially, the researchers point out the

disconnect between the theoretical research and the applied research, emphasizing that the

theoretical research needs to be applied to naturalistic classroom environments. Therefore, they

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conduct the present research in a natural, large-enrollment chemistry classroom as opposed to in

a research laboratory setting. This study suggests that self-explanation can be effectively

implemented in the context of real college learning environments.

Wylie, Koedinger & Mitamura (2010)

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether self-explanation is a beneficial

instructional strategy for second language grammar learning, specifically, for learning the

English article system. Self-explanation has shown great promise in increasing learning by

encouraging students to focus on key features of the material and has been found to be an

effective domain general strategy for a variety of domains (Roy & Chi, 2005). Yet, most studies

have been done in math and science domains like physics, geometry, and biology and relatively

little work has been done outside of math and science domains. This study moves to the domain

of second language grammar learning and addresses whether the self-explanation effect extends

to a different type of domain like second language acquisition.

The researchers chose the English article system as a domain because there are

fundamental differences between math and science learning and second language grammar

acquisition that may affect the effectiveness of self-explanation strategy in the language learning

domain. In addition, the article system is suitable for studying the effects of self-explanation in

second language learning due to its rule-based nature that requires underlying rules to determine

when each article should be used. To examine the effects of prompted self-explanation within the

context of second language grammar learning, the study poses the following hypothesis: students
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 6

in the explanation choice condition will show greater learning gains on article choice and

explanation choice tasks than those in the article choice condition.

Method

The study took place in the University of Pittsburgh’s English Language Institute during

one 50-minute class period. The sample consisted of 118 adult English language learners (mean

age=27.9, SD=7.2) who represented 13 first languages. There were three class levels:

intermediate (n= 30), intermediate-advanced (n= 61) and advanced (n= 27).

The experimental session started with all participants completing both the article choice

and explanation choice pretests. Next, participants were randomly assigned to two computer-

based tutoring conditions, either the article choice or explanation choice condition. In the article

choice condition, students selected the article (a, an, the, no article) that best completed the

sentence, but were not asked to give an explanation for their choice. Students received immediate

feedback on their answers and had access to hints. In the explanation choice condition, students

were given a sentence with the correct article highlighted and asked to choose the rule of the

sentence that best explained the article use, but do not make any article decisions of their own.

Likewise, students received immediate feedback on their answers and had access to hints.

Finally, all students were assessed on both article choice and explanation choice items as

posttests. The article selection items were the same form as those in the article choice condition

and the explanation selection items were also the identical form of those in the explanation

choice condition.

Since data collection was limited to one 50-minute class period, 86% (101 out of 117) of

the students completed all tasks; however, attrition between conditions was not the same as 95%

(55 out of 58) of students in the article choice condition and 77% (46 out of 60) of students in the
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 7

explanation choice condition completed all tasks. Although there was no significant difference in

the pretest scores between conditions after attrition, the researchers used Propensity score

matching (PSM) to adjust for possible differences due to attrition and the results were no

different with or without the PSM variable. The rationale for grouping students using propensity

score is that the propensity score is highly correlated with whether or not a student would

complete the posttests (r (115) =0.84, p < 0.001).

Results

A repeated measures ANOVA indicates that students in both article choice and

explanation choice conditions demonstrate significant pre to posttest improvement on both the

article choice items (F (1, 95) = 29.44, p <0.001) and the explanation choice items (F (1, 91)

=15.09, p < 0.001). In addition, the univariate between-subjects tests show that the conditions

more significantly affected explanation choice posttest scores (p=0.023) than article choice

posttest scores (p=0.153). Cross-task transfer occurs for both conditions: students in the article

choice tutoring group show improvement on the explanation choice posttest, and students in the

explanation choice tutoring group show improvement on the article choice posttest although both

groups had no tutored practice with these tasks. However, the effects of the self-explanation

tutoring condition appear stronger than the article choice tutoring condition.

Figure 4: Normalized gains scores for article choice and explanation choice measures
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 8

As normalized gain scores illustrate above, students in the explanation choice condition are

showing equal gains on the article choice posttest compared to students in the article choice

condition and significantly higher gains on the explanation choice posttest.

In regard to the processing time, a repeated measures ANOVA indicates that students in

both conditions are significantly faster at completing the posttest than the pretest for both article

choice test (F (1,95) = 76.28, p < 0.001) and explanation choice test (F (1, 91) = 275. 32, p <

0.001). More importantly, a MANCOVA analysis with log-transformed completion times for

article choice and explanation choice posttests as dependent variables shows no main effect for

condition (F (2, 88) = 0.37, p= 0.689). Overall, there is no significant difference between

students in the self-explanation and the article choice conditions in completing the posttests.

Discussion

The findings of this study suggest that self-explanation can be an effective instructional

strategy not only for math and science domains, but also for the domain like second language

grammar learning. The self-explanation prompts in the explanation choice condition help

students correctly use articles as well as explicitly identify the underlying rules for their
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 9

decisions. In addition, self-explanation does not increase learning time as students in the

explanation choice condition solve the posttest problems as fast as those in the article choice

condition, thus improving speed and accuracy of language learning.

Especially, students in the explanation choice condition have stronger learning effects

that they show equal gains on the article choice items and substantially higher gains on the

explanation choice items compared to those in the article choice condition. The reasonable

explanation for this result might be that students see the correct article highlighted in the problem

sentence and then combine it with self-explanation prompts, and this process more likely to

encourage students to focus on the features of the sentence that are important for making article

decisions.

In sum, the present findings support the assumption of Roy and Chi (2005) who proposed

that self-explanation prompts encourage students to notice relevant features of the problems and

enable students to become aware of gaps in their own knowledge. This study is one of the first to

investigate the effects of self-explanation on second language learning and suggests positive

results that prompted self-explanation may be beneficial to second language learning students by

helping them develop explicit knowledge of the grammatical rules.

Critique

Two weaknesses of this study should be noted. As pointed out by the researchers, there

are limitations related to the generalizability of the results because less than 80% of the students

in the explanation choice group finished all five stages of the study due to the limited data

collection time. The study admitted that the researchers couldn’t make strong claims about those

students who couldn’t finish the posttest and vaguely stated that “perhaps self-explanation is not

appropriate for all students”, which could diminish the credibility of the findings of this study.
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 10

Another shortcoming of this study concerns the students’ prior knowledge. Students in all

conditions had received at least some prior instruction on article use. Thus, it is not clear whether

or not the results come from the effects of self-explanation alone. In order to further investigate

these issues, future work would be needed for novice learners with no or little prior knowledge

of article rules.

Despite a few weaknesses, the strength of this study lies in its thorough discussion of the

method and results in a very concise and succinct way. The researchers analyze data with and

without the propensity score matching (PSM) variable to address the possible bias caused by

attrition and report the results that include not only ANOVA and MANCOVA, but also PSM for

a less biased and more accurate description of the findings. In addition, the findings were

reported in four areas that encompass learning gains, processing time, hint usage, and effects of

first language, which are important information for language instructors in determining whether

or not they implement the findings into classroom instructions. As for the contributions, the

study offers an important contribution to the self-explanation research literature by providing

additional support that self-explanation is beneficial not only for math and science domains but

also for second language grammar acquisition and can foster both procedural and declarative

knowledge. Further, the findings from this study contribute to the field of second language

learning in terms of the superiority of explicit versus implicit grammar instruction. This study

supports Norris and Ortega’s (2000) view that explicit practice of rules, like the explanation

choice condition, is a more effective instructional strategy than an implicit approach to learning,

like the article choice condition.

Villalta-Cerdas & Sandi-Urena (2014)

THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 11

This study approaches the self-explanation effect from a different perspective than the

previous article. In this study, the researchers examine whether different self-explaining tasks

modify student self-explaining behavior. Their assumption is that students are more likely to

engage in self-explaining when different self-explanation tasks are required. Therefore,

appropriate instruction in the naturalistic classroom setting can effectively modify students’ self-

explanation behaviors. The researchers identify the need for the applied research of the self-

explanation effect in chemistry education because self-explaining is an essential and desirable

scientific competence recommended by the US Next Generation Science Standards (2013). In

addition, despite the substantial research literature demonstrating the positive links between self-

explaining and conceptual learning, there are only two articles which have explored the self-

explanation effect in chemical education.

This study of the self-explaining effect is different from other work in several aspects.

First of all, participants in the study are in their normal learning environments as opposed to in

research experimental settings. Data collection also takes place within a naturalistic college level

large-enrollment chemistry classroom. Second, the self-explanation demand is increased at four

different levels by modifying the prompts describing the task instead of spontaneous self-

explanations. Lastly, this study focuses on conceptual understanding or a transfer task of

chemistry rather than learning procedural knowledge such as using worked-out examples. In

order to investigate an association between the self-explaining tasks and students’ self-explaining

behavior, the study specifically addresses the following research question: Do tasks that require

different levels of self-explaining effectively induce observable, categorical differences in self-

explaining behavior in the context of a General Chemistry classroom?

Method
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 12

The study was conducted in a large, urban, public university in the U.S. and gathered data

from 128 students enrolled in General Chemistry 2. Majors in General Chemistry 2 comprised of

61% pre-professional (pre-Medicine, pre-Pharmacy and Health Sciences), 23% other sciences

(Physics, Biology, Geology, etc.) or Math, 8% Engineering, and 6% Chemistry. The tasks in this

study were embedded within the normal requirements of the course to reflect the complexities of

a live learning environment; therefore, students considered this as part of their normal

assignments.

The learning event consisted of a textbook passage with a general description of the

Second law of the Thermodynamics. The researchers created four self-explanation tasks (SE-

Tasks) which is designed to promote different levels of self-explaining engagement, each

defining one of the study conditions described in Table 1. The calibration of the conditions is

based on literature reports (Fonseca& Chi, 2010), especially Siegler and Lin’s (2009) multi-

condition comparison studies.

Table 1 Description of self-explaining tasks (SE-Tasks)

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The students were randomly assigned to one of the four SE-Tasks conditions by random

number generation. The number of students in each condition was: SEA (n=29), EADA (n=31),

SEO (n=35), SEIA (n=33). The students read the passage presented to them and wrote a written

response to the given self-explanation task. Think-aloud protocols were not an option for this

study due to the large experimental group and researchers’ desire to gather data in the most

naturalistic environment possible. Materials were printed, administered, and timed in the same

way other in-class assignments were typically given. Written explanations were collected,

photocopied, assigned an alphanumeric code, and later transcribed to electronic support.

The study used two analytical methods for textual analysis of data: a coding scheme and

Latent Profile Analysis (LPA). The final coding scheme for textual analysis and a brief

description of each code type is shown in Table 3. LPA is a model-based statistical technique to

find qualitative differences among participants based on observed variables. In this study, the

researchers analyzed the code-ratios (number of code type divided by total codes in response) in

student’s response as observed variables. LPA helps this study minimize researcher bias in the

categorization of student responses in explanatory behaviors and elicit otherwise overlooked

trends in data analysis.

Table 3 Final coding scheme for written responses

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Results

The Chi-square test showed that there is a statistically significant association between the

code type and the SE-Task at a 95% confidence level, 2 (9, N = 357) = 22.50, p < 0.05. The

results in Table 4 show evidence for the differences in total number of code types per SE-Task.

Table 4 Main study learning event code type distribution by SE-Task

The highest percentage of occurrences of BI (bridging inference) came from the SEA

(self-explaining-own-answer) task which effectively prompted students to connect chemistry

concepts. For DI (deductive inference), the main source was the SEIA (self-explaining-incorrect-

answer) task. The combined count of codes BI and DI was 169 (44% of the total count), which
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 15

suggested that the generation of inferences was a considerable component of the responses. In

the case of the code E (elaboration), the highest percentage came from the EADA (self-explain-

agreement/disagreement) task where students brought in information that was not provided in the

materials. Lastly, the code P (paraphrasing) showed the similar high percentage for EADA (self-

explain-agreement/disagreement) and SEO (self-explain-for-others). The code E and P are

associated with less sophisticated explanatory behaviors as they reflect recounting of information

rather than generation of inferences. The code type distribution supported an association between

the code types in the student responses and the SE-Task prompts assigned to them. This

association suggests that the self-explaining prompts the researchers designed for the study

effectively produced an observable effect on the students’ self-explaining behaviors.

Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) showed five patterns of the student behaviors in terms of

the self-explanation profiles. The Chi-square test showed a significant association between the

SE-Profile and SE-Task at a 95% confidence level, 2 (12, N = 128) = 22.75, p < 0.05. Table 6

shows a trend in the percentage distribution of SE-Profiles across SE-Tasks.

Table 6 Percentage distribution of SE-Profile across SE-Task

The SEA task (self-explain-own-answer) had the highest percentage of students in the SE-

Profiles associated with the more analytic self-explaining behaviors (i.e., bridging inferential and
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 16

mixed-behavior). In other words, more students in SEA task engaged in generating inferences

and connecting ideas. On the other hand, SEIA (self-explain-incorrect-answer) and EADA

(explain-agreement/disagreement with others) showed a higher percentage of students in the less

analytical self-explaining behaviors (i.e., elaborative and summative/paraphrasing). Although the

SEO (self-explain-for-others) task showed a moderately high percentage in bridging inferential

and deductive inferential behaviors, it produced less sophisticated self-explaining behaviors

compared to SEA. One plausible explanation for this is that students in SEA task focus on

repairing what they do not understand without focusing on others (Chi, 2009).

Discussion

Based on the results, the researchers concluded that students’ self-explanatory behaviors

are associated with the tasks of different self-explaining demand. In other words, the way the

tasks are framed for students can positively influence students’ engagement in producing more

sophisticated self-explaining behaviors. Therefore, instructors can effectively modify students’

self-explaining practices through the thoughtful instructional design in the naturalistic classroom

setting. The findings also showed that some students defaulted to paraphrasing regardless of the

SE-Tasks. This reveals that students may resist explaining when prompted, in addition to not

spontaneously engaging in self-explaining. All in all, the study put emphasis on the fact that a

considerable number of students engaged in self-explaining upon prompting and that the

sophistication of self-explaining behavior was modifiable by the design of the task.

It is not surprising that the same instructional activity may trigger varied self-explaining

responses in different students. Individual differences in interacting with the prompts might be

because students have different prior knowledge, attitudes, learning strategies, and personal

history in general. Therefore, acknowledging students’ individual differences and considering

THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 17

other situational factors in implementing self-explaining strategy are important as in designing

other instructional devices. For this reason, the researchers suggested that a variety of prompts

may be more effective than a prescriptive, one-size-fits-all type of prompt. Although the

resistance or the lack of ability to construct self-explanation may not be resolved quickly, the

results from this study that the qualities of student self-explanation could be tweaked through the

design of learning instruction can be of value to educators.

Critique

The weakness of this study is the analysis of the textual data of students’ written

responses. Although the researchers removed prompts from the responses for the textual

analysis, coders might have inferred the self-explaining task from the structure of the responses.

As a result, coders may be prone to categorize student’s self-explaining behaviors based on the

condition and not on the analysis of the responses. This might lead to a potential coder bias. One

thing I wish the researchers investigated further is that how different kinds of self-explaining

tasks would influence learning of specific chemistry concepts.

A key strength of this study lies in its attempt to minimizing “observer’s paradox”, which

is the notion that participants tend to adjust their behavior some other way when they are under

the impression of being observed. Unlike other tightly controlled experimental studies, the

participants in this study had no cues that this learning event was part of educational research as

the procedures were consistent with their normal in-class assignments. Therefore, evidence

gathered from this study would reflect more real-world situation. By conducting research in the

context of real college science learning environments, this study contributed to improving the

understanding of self-explaining in chemistry education. Especially, this study can inform

college instructors about the positive links between self-explaining and learning, thus influencing
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 18

their decisions about the development and implementation of self-explanation in large

enrollment college courses.

Connections

The findings from the two studies support the assumption that self-explanation is a

constructive cognitive activity that helps students engage in active learning and knowledge-

building. More specifically, self-explanation encourages students to attend to the learning

material in a more meaningful way by integrating concepts and generating inferences while

effectively monitoring their comprehension. Results observed in these studies have implications

for teachers and students. The study by Wylie et al. (2010) demonstrateed that self-explanation is

beneficial for second language grammar acquisition and increases students’ procedural

knowledge (article choice) and declarative knowledge (rationale behind the article choice). This

suggests a clear reason for ESL teachers to integrate self-explanation prompts into their grammar

instructions and explicitly identify the underlying rules of English grammar.

The second study by Villalta-Cerdas and Sandi-Urena (2014) similarly suggests that the

ability to generate self-explanation become an essential learning outcome for students because it

helps students focus on connections between parts and cause-effect relationship. Therefore,

chemistry instructors should take advantage of the benefits of self-explaining and integrate this

evidence-based learning strategy into their instructional design to improve science education.

Results of this study also have implications for students. Self-explaining is a learnable strategy

and may become habitual upon practice through effective implementation. Students should take

an active role in learning and do more sense-making by using self-explaining as a learning

strategy.
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 19

The two studies proposed some interesting possibilities for future research. As for the

first study by Wylie et al. (2010), future work is needed to investigate how being able to explain

article rules could enhance students’ article use in natural speech. As the ultimate goal of

learning article rules is a spontaneous article production in speaking without reflection on rules,

the explicit declarative knowledge of the rules might not be required for successful

communication. Hence, it may be a good opportunity for a future study to investigate further

how attained declarative knowledge may or may not improve student’s communicative

competence in terms of accurate article use. The second study by Villalta-Cerdas and Sandi-

Urena (2014) suggested future investigation of what individual characteristics may be associated

with differential self-explaining behavior. Examining what triggers the individual differences in

self-explaining responses to the same self-explaining prompts would be an important next step.

In conclusion, there is considerable evidence to suggest that implementing activities that

elicit self-explaining can generate many learning outcomes including problem-solving skills,

conceptual understanding and monitoring the comprehension process (Siegler & Lin, 2009).

However, as mentioned in the introduction section, self-explaining has not gained sufficient

recognition by many educators due to the lack of awareness of its potential to promote learning.

Although self-explaining is an experimentally tested effective instructional method, there is the

disconnect between what researchers have figured out and the practice of everyday instruction. It

is difficult to modify an instructional strategy. This may be in part because students become

accustomed to learning environments where they are not expected to actively engage with the

learning materials (this is the case for most Asian students). But for the most part, I believe it is

probably because instructors tend to teach the way they were taught and are more comfortable

with the use of traditional teacher-centered and lecture-based methods. It might take some time
THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 20

and effort to persuade students and teachers to act differently. I hope this paper is convincing and

able to contribute in promoting the use of self-explaining as a learning and instructional strategy

by more educators and students alike.

THE SELF-EXPLANATION EFFECT 21

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