Spontaneous Verbal Elaboration in Gifted and Non-Gifted Youths

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Abstract
In two experiments, differences were investigated between gifted youths and comparison groups with respect to: (a) performance on paired-associate tasks involving meaningful and nonmeaningful words; (b) reported use of spontaneously produced learning strategies; and (c) degree to which learning strategies facilitated recall. Under free-study conditions, gifted youths outperformed their age peers in recall and strategy use, for both meaningful and nonmeaningful word pairs. In both experiments, gifted youths appeared to benefit greatly from mediational strategy use. Results of this and previous investigations, taken together, suggest that the learning of gifted students may be inhibited by rate learning environments which are too highly structured. When gifted learners were allowed to study at their own pace and develop their own learning strategies, performance increased.

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