The influence of overt practice, achievement level, and explanatory style on calibration accuracy and performance

The authors measured the influence of overt calibration practice, achievement level, and explanatory style on calibration accuracy and exam performance. Students (N = 356) were randomly assigned to either an overt practice or no-practice condition. Students in the overt practice condition made predictions and postdictions about their performance across 5 quizzes by entering their estimates online just before and after completing the quizzes. Students in the no-practice condition did not enter their predictions and postdictions for their quiz performance. Results did not support the hypothesis that overt calibration practice on the quizzes would improve calibration accuracy or exam performance. Higher achieving students were significantly more accurate in their predictions, yet underconfident in their predictions; lower achieving students were less accurate and overconfident. Approximately 32% of the unique variance from achievement, prediction accuracy, and postdiction accuracy was explained by student explanatory style concerning student-centered factors related to studying and test taking and to a task-centered factor.