Howard F. Gallup and Robert W. Allan
Psychology Department
Lafayette College
Abstract
Three books on the teaching of psychology are examined for their coverage of the Personalized System of Instruction (PSI), an innovative technology which is extremely effective. Since these books are very likely to be used by teachers of psychology, it behooves authors and editors to be fair and accurate when reporting and criticizing any aspect of instruction. In two of the books, the sampling of materials on PSI is not representative of the literature on PSI. In one of these two books, the accuracy of criticisms made about PSI by the three authors who mention PSI is questioned strongly . In the other book, two of the three selections indexed under PSI are only marginally related to PSI.
Introduction
Criticism is at the heart of science and is essential to progress in any endeavor, including teaching techniques. But that criticism ought to be based upon careful analysis of that which is being critiqued as well as on a fair coverage of the issues. There are three somewhat recent books on the teaching of psychology, two of which include some material on the Personalized System of Instruction (PSI) in a manner which we consider to be unfair in the sense that, in our opinion, the materials are sampled strangely and/or are inaccurate. The third book (Spencer, 1988) contains some useful and accurate information on PSI. Someone who is interested in the teaching of psychology, perhaps from an historical perspective or perhaps looking for ideas for future use, might be expected to search out and read these books under the assumption that the material has been reviewed carefully before publication. After all, one of the books (Hartley and McKeachie, 1990) was co-edited by McKeachie, one of the best-known names in the teaching of psychology, was published by the American Psychological Association, and samples articles from ToP (APA's Division 2 Teaching of Psychology); the other (Puente, Matthews, and Brewer, 1992) was co-edited by another very well-known name in the teaching of psychology, Brewer, the current editor of ToP. We find that the coverage of PSI in Hartley and McKeachie (1990) misrepresents PSI, with the exception of the chapter by Kulik, Kulik, and Cohen (1990). We also intend to argue that the criticisms levelled at PSI by three authors in Teaching Psychology in America: A History, edited by Puente, Matthews, and Brewer (1992) misrepresent PSI and are incorrect, and thus need some very careful attention and modification. It is one thing to level accurate criticism, but it is quite another to level criticism that is patently inaccurate.
The Personalized System of Instruction (PSI)
PSI, Personalized System of Instruction, made its public debut in the first issue of The Journal of Applied Behavioral Analysis, when Fred Keller described this new approach to instruction (Keller, 1968). (PSI is also known as "The Keller Method.") The method was introduced in 1962 by Keller, J. Gilmore Sherman, and two psychologists at the University of Brazilia. It was designed to utilize what was known about the functional relations between behavior and the environment and is based upon what was known about student behavior as it is maintained by contingencies of reinforcement. Briefly, "those features which seem to distinguish (PSI) from conventional teaching procedures" include:
"(1) The go-at-your-own-pace feature, which permits a student to move through the course at a speed commensurate with his ability and other demands upon his time.
"(2) The unit-perfection requirement for advance, which lets the student go ahead to new material only after demonstrating mastety of that which preceded."
"(3) The use of lectures and demonstrations as vehicles of motivation, rather than sources of critical information.
"(4) The related stress upon the written word in teacher-student communications; and, finally:
"(5) The use of proctors, which permits repeated testing, immediate scoring, almost unavoidable tutoring, and a marked enhancement of the personal-social aspect of the educational process." (Keller, 1968, p. 83; italics in the original)
It has been several years since a comprehensive analysis of PSI has appeared in print. However, Reboy and Semb (1991) published an article in Teaching of Psychology (ToP) which contains some review material and a good list of references for anyone who wants to be introduced fairly and carefully to PSI; Buskist, et al. (1991) also provide an excellent summary and evaluation of PSI. These authors addressed some, but not all, of the points we wish to cover. We recommend strongly that anyone interested in teaching psychology and/or in the teaching of psychology read, as a minimum, both of these articles before drawing any conclusions about PSI as a method of instruction. We urge further reading on PSI for anyone who has read the two books noted above since reliance on them would likely lead to a dismissal summarily of PSI based upon poor information. For a thorough coverage, we refer the reader to the articles already mentioned and to four volumes: Sherman (1974), Keller and Koen (1976), Keller and Sherman (1982), and Sherman, Ruskin, and Semb 1982).
Hartley and McKeachie (1990)
Although Hartley and McKeachie (1990) stated that their book would not cover the "whole field of teaching psychology," they did sample the 16 volumes of ToP available in 1990 for "articles that are interesting and provocative (and) that will provide food-for-thought for an international readership" (Harfley and McKeachie, 1990, p. vii). We find their sample of three articles on PSI to be both sparse and strange. The chapter by Kulik, Kulik, and Cohen (1990) is an excellent selection for this book since it provides a meta-analysis of the empirical data "from more than 300 studies reported during the past 25 years" (p.27) suggesting strongly that PSI is a superior system of instruction. However, the chapters by Allen (1990) and Cumming (1990) deal only marginally with PSI. Although the title of Allen's (1990) paper contains "Personalized System of Instruction," it is not at all clear from his method section that his course used PSI in a form at all similar to that devised by Keller. Allen did make use of repeated re-writing of papers, but "mastery" is problematical in the grading of creative essays and a 3-day turn-around time with papers graded by the professor does not conform very closely to Keller's proctor criterion. It is even more difficult to understand why the paper by Cumming (1990) is indexed by the editors under PSI. The description of the course bears no relationship to PSI. Although Cumming used the word "proctor," this individual played a role far different from that in a typical PSI course, and the burden of this study is a comparison of the performance of students in mixed versus streamed groups. A summarizing sentence makes this clear: "Both types of class organization are workable, but students prefer a varied ability in small work groups." (Cumming, 1990, p. 67) Of all the articles published on PSI in ToP over the years, it is unclear why two of these three papers were chosen to represent perhaps the most successful teaching technique ever developed.
Spencer (1988)
A somewhat fair and useful discussion of PSI may be found in Spencer (1988), even though this author leans strongly towards a cognitive approach to the understanding of the teaching/learning interface. At the conclusion of his chapter on Mastery Learning, in which he covers and compares Bloom's Learning for Mastery (LFM) and Keller's PSI, Spencer states: "In many ways the work of Bloom and Keller in their mastery learning systems represents the summit of achievement for the neo-behaviourist 'systems' approach to instruction. Both were built on firm, though differing, psychological principles and of all the applications of the behavioural approach to the technology of education, LFM and PSI represent the only methods which consistently produce significant educational results." (Spencer, 1988, p.98) However, Spencer does not draw clearly the stronger conclusion that PSI is the only instructional method that has produced empirical data showing it to be superior to other forms of instruction, not just to other behavioral forms. (See Kulik, et al., 1979, for a meta-analysis of the outcomes of different methods of instruction.)
It is also interesting to note that Spencer does not draw any strong conclusions about the "educa- tional results" of any of the other approaches covered in his book. The chapter on "The Art of Teaching and the Science of Learning," devoted to issues in operant conditioning and programmed instruction, ends with the following sentence: "It may well be that learning theories are irrelevant to the solution of such problems, as Gagne (1962) and McKeachie (1974) have suggested. After all, the history of automated instruction goes back at least as far as 1860... (Spencer, 1988, p.38). We find it very strange to consider learning theories irrelevant to the solution of problems in learning. Moreover, the use of programmed instruction should not be equated with automated instruction: the former is a method for presenting material according to principles of learning while the latter deals with hardware. It is true that the two have been linked together very closely, but that is not a necessary link. One of the major reasons for the demise of "teaching machines," in addition to the fear and resistance to change on the part of educators, lies in the undisciplined dumping of poorly constructed materials by publishers onto the market. We call the reader's attention to a detailed and quite merciless critique of one set of materials, designed, in the author's words as "an interactive program... especially designed to shape mastery of behavioral objectives (and which) make the system easy to use in PSI... courses." (Gallup, 1978, p. 50). Programmed materials should be constructed by those who understand the basic principles of operant conditioning, such as reinforcement, shaping, and fading. PSI materials should also be constructed by those who understand such principles, and equally importantly by those who are not just looking for an easy way to teach.
Spencer's chapter on "Constructing Reality" presents Piaget's approach to learning as well as some attempts to use computers. "Most of the research has concentrated on problem solving and the learning of mathematical skills, but in general results have been disappointing. . . . Behaviouristic and neo-behaviouristic methods may establish optimum learning of what is already known, but it is other methods, such as those advocated by Piaget and Papert, which may ultimately (italics added) lead to the qualitatively different aspects of cognition associated with the invention of the presently unknown." (Spencer, 1988, p.165-166). It may be interesting to speculate on what may ultimately lead to what but is presently unknown; we prefer to base our thinking on existing information. Therefore, we turn our attention back to PSI and the treatment it has received in Puente, et al. (1992). As Keller said so simply: "I was later to discover that the enemy is everywhere." (Keller, 1993).
Puente, Matthews, and Brewer (1992)
We began our reading in Puente, et al. (1992) with a search for PSI in the index; Keller was cited by two of the authors in the book, and referred to by one other. It took all of ten minutes to read what all three authors had to say. In a book with 551 pages of text, four pages is somewhat sparse coverage for an innovation in teaching which is the only one that has produced consistently superior performance on the part of students (Kulik, et al., 1979). McKeachie, in an interview with Halonen, stated: "I think the thing that really took over was Fred Keller's PSI. It was very popular and effective, certainly more effective for learning than the large lecture." (Halonen, 1992, p. 229). Beins stated that "the method has found favor among some teachers of psychology, with consistently positive results.... The enthusiasm for PSI has diminished, however, if recent reports are reliable (e.g., Caldwell, 1985; Keller, 1985)." (Beins, 1992, p. 538).
Enthusiasm for PSI has certainly diminished, contrary to the overly-optimistic prediction that "PSI seems to be here to stay" (Gallup, 1978). Enthusiasm has probably waned for several reasons, but the system should not be dismissed by the authors of a major volume on teaching of psychology simply because enthusiasm for it has waned. Since the empirical data (Kulik, et al., 1979) suggest strongly that the method is superior to all those against which it has been compared, it is necessary to identify the real reasons for any waning enthusiasm.
Most of our teaching here at Lafayette College has used GSI, Fred Keller's term for "group system of instruction" (Keller, 1985), but the Psychology Department was committed to using PSI for its introductory courses for about 13 years, from 1968 through 1981. The method was discontinued for several reasons, none of which was even remotely related to any pedagogical weaknesses in PSI. Quite the contrary: the demise of PSI was the result of problems which arose from the very successful use of PSI in a hostile setting; also, the first author became Department Head in 1981. One sure fact about PSI and chairing a department is that both require a great deal of time and energy, if they are to be done well.
The problems endemic to using PSI which arose have been reported in detail (Gallup, 1971). They include problems one encounters when preparing to offer a PSI course, while such a course is in progress, and after such a course has been operating and has begun to create a reputation around the campus. The first two sets of problems include a greatly increased workload, plus a change in the behavior of the instructor from the more typical "professing role" to one of "manager of student learning" (the training of proctors, the arranging of reinforcing contingencies for learning, the construction of multiple unit tests, etc.). The last set of problems includes campus rumors, the different meaning of grades which confuses and infuriates administrators, better preparation for upper level courses, changing attitudes by students as to what good teaching ought to be, and increased enrollments. With the inclusion of other faculty (both in and beyond the department) and administrators, add the demand for "explanations" for what you are doing instead of teaching, justification for not using grades as everyone else uses them, requests for advice by some faculty who become interested (including the need to explain behavioral analysis and contingency management to colleagues, psychologists as well as physicists, mathematicians, and assorted others), and complaints from colleagues teaching courses for which the PSI course is a prerequisite. Such complaints include their need to cope with student attitudes and expectations if they conduct their courses using GSI, as well as with a reduced need to re-teach prerequisite materials, thus requiring alterations in the syllabi of subsequent courses. "Please note that some of these problems would be relevant only for personalized courses; others of these problems would be relevant for any attempt at innovation in college teaching, the severity of the problems increasing directly with the success of the innovation." (Gallup, 1971, p.128) Since PSI was so successful, a statement supported by both learning outcomes and student attitudes, it has received a large amount of criticism from almost every aspect of education, except from the students.
Another major reason for the diminished interest in using PSI can be traced to the bandwagon effect created when publishers of introductory textbooks included poorly designed "PSI" materials in their ancillary packages (Gallup and Waranch, 1978). The quotation marks are intentional to show our opinion of the quality of most of these materials. (See Gallup, 1978 for a detailed review of one such set of materials.) In addition, faculty members, psychologists and others, began offering "PSI" courses without knowing what they were doing; when such courses were not very successful, the PSI method was blamed rather than its implementation. Psychology professors, instead of creating their own materials, used packaged materials which were poorly written (Gallup & Warranch, 1978).
Unfortunately, as McKeachie noted in his interview: "In many cases it (PSI) was taught with true-false and multiple-choice testing;" but he then added the gratuitous opinion: "so the approach addressed very low level kinds of learning." (Halonen, 1992, p. 229, italics added) This is a terribly unfair criticism of PSI, or of any method of instruction. It ignores the fact that any "approach" or method can address any kind of learning, and many of us using PSI did address complex learning (see Kulik, et al., 1979, and Reboy and Semb, 1991), and it ignores the fact that large numbers of lecture courses use low level testing, some exclusively. One has only to look at the Study Guides and Test Banks of the myriad of published introductory textbooks, filled with low-level, volume-specific items, to verify this point, textbooks used almost exclusively in large lecture courses where objective tests are the only assessments used. There is nothing in the methods of PSI which requires the use of true/false or multiple choice items. Presumably, any form of testing may be used, as long as there is some form of immediate interaction with a proctor or the professor to provide feedback on student performance.
As Reboy and Semb conclude: "Finally, as an instructional delivery system, PSI cannot be held accountable for what is taught in a given course. That responsibility lies with course designers and their willingness to create objectives that emphasize higher order skills and whose materials both teach and assess those skills." (Reboy and Semb, 1991, p.214). For an honest and fair critique of the teaching of psychology (or of any discipline), "PSI" can and should be replaced in the above quotation by each and every delivery system that is being used or has ever been used, from Socrates to the present.
Pittenger (in Puente, et al., 1992, p. 157) began his two paragraph coverage of PSI with the following: "There is little doubt that Fred S. Keller introduced one of the most radical departures from conventional methods of teaching through the creation of the personalized system of instruction (PSI)." However, a few sentences later, the following statements occur: "Although the PSI has been criticized by others (e.g., Caldwell, 1985), it should be noted that Keller remained objective in his analysis of the utility of this method of instruction. As would any well-trained experimental psychologist, Keller relied on objective data to form his conclusions. Therefore, it is to his credit that Keller later recanted his own teaching method: 'The system was unrealistic and involved too many people... and in the last analysis, it was unnecessary' (Keller, 1985, p. 8)" (Pittenger, 1992, p.158). We will turn first to Caldwell's article for the so-called criticisms of PSI; but we will return shortly to Keller's so-called recantation, with a more complete quotation from the concluding paragraph of Keller's invited address to Division 2 of the APA, the division on the Teaching of Psychology. It seems eminently clear to us that Pittinger did not read either Caldwell or Keller very carefully.
Caldwell's (1985) article is titled: "Dangers of PSI." His criticisms of study questions and the behavior of proctors are important for anyone who makes use of them. We were pleased to see him refer to Meek (1977) as the author of a "vicious, if not particularly useful, attack on the PSI approach" (p. 9) since one of us had dug even more deeply into Meek's diatribe almost 20 years ago (Gallup, 1977). It is important to note that, as Caldwell draws his conclusion that "Low level of content and cheating are two problems that are serious threats to PSI" (p.12), he also notes, very importantly, that "These comments regarding PSI are not to be taken as unique to self-instructional approaches. Cheating is recognized as a potential problem in traditional classes. . . . Unfortunately, those employing traditional methods have seldom concerned themselves with the problem of content. The PSI approach, with its emphasis on informing the student of what is to be learned, at least makes the level-of-content issue explicit. In the traditional approach it unfortunately remains hidden and unnoticed, since instructors never have to specify what they are trying to teach." (Caldwell, 1985, p. 12). Although Pittenger stated that "PSI has been criticized by others (e.g., Caldwell, 1985)," in point of fact, Caldwell does not criticze PSI. On the contrary, he notes problems with which PSI and any other delivery system must contend, and notes that PSI is a big step ahead of other delivery systems in dealing with those problems.
Pittenger's other misreading of materials on PSI lies in what seems to us to be his serious misinterpretation of Fred Keller's Invited Address to Divison 2 of the APA (Keller, 1985): "Keller later recanted his own teaching method:" (Pittenger, 1992, p. 158). Maybe one has to know Fred Keller, or be present to hear him speak, to appreciate his wit; maybe not. But we cannot read any kind of recantation into his address. His words must be kept in context and the reader needs to be aware of his typical tongue-in-cheek style. The reader ought to study Keller's entire address, but his last sentences, not just the part quoted selectively by Pittenger, make the point for us: "The system was unrealistic and involved too many people; it was too expensive, and possibly immoral; and, in the last analysis, it was unnecessary. Some well-selected teachers and some well-selected students can look after all that we require in higher education. What we really need today is the early separation of the sheep from the goats, together with the strategies of molecular genetics. If I may coin a slogan: GSI plus DNA is A-OK!" (Keller, 1985, p.8).
Fred Keller, with his wisdom and his insights and a life time of research into human learning and its applications to education, could never deny the possibilities and realities of the power of environmental contingencies to alter behavior. If "Keller (had) relied on objective data to form his conclusions" (Pittenger, 1992, p. 158), he would have stated, modestly as was his manner, that PSI has apparently been somewhat successful; and he could have cited large numbers of articles to support a far stronger conclusion. The statements by Pittenger (1992), if taken literally, would contradict everything that Fred Keller said and did throughout his distinguished career as a teacher and behaviorist. As recently as 1993, in a talk at the Eastern Psychological Association convention, Keller spoke to this topic and, although somewhat discouraged by the educational community's lack of support for PSI, maintained quite strongly that PSI is a superior approach to teaching. "Nowhere, to my knowledge, has anyone suggested that group instruction by the lecture method, a product of the Middle Ages, might possibly be the source of all our troubles." (Keller, 1993).
Conclusion
The treatise by Spencer (1988) raises some of the issues discussed here, plus others of a different sort related to preferences for a cognitive approached to the teaching/learning interface. There is some coverage of PSI in the edited volume by Hartley and McKeachie (1990), but not very much. However, we are seriously disturbed that Teaching Psychology in America: A History, published by the American Psychological Association, and written and edited by psychology faculty, could contain material apparently based upon such patently careless reading. We are led to wonder how carefully the rest of the book was written. In our opinion, "The life and times of PSI" (Buskist, et al., 1991) is a more careful analysis of PSI and should be read as an antidote to the material on PSI in the APA volume on the Teaching of Psychology in America. (Puente, et al., 1992). The reader whose interest in PSI may have been aroused should read the four volumes mentioned earlier: Sherman (1974), Keller and Koen (1976, Keller and Sherman (1982), and Sherman, Ruskin, and Semb (1982).
It is unclear why so many prominent, influential teachers of psychology might misinterpret so badly PSI and its potential impact on teaching in general. We might speculate that many professors would have reason to provide rationale for their present approaches to teaching, almost all of which have been shown to be inferior to PSI. Although there are valid complaints about PSI (work load, complaints of grade inflation by administrations, etc.,) it has been abundantly clear for many years that there is no pedagogical reason for deprecating PSI or for rejecting it outright. It remains a superior method of instruction.
References
Allen, G. J. (1990). "Using a personalized system of instruction to improve the writing skills of undergraduates." In Hartley, J. and McKeachie, W. J. (eds.) Teaching Psycholociy: A handbook: Readings from "Teaching of Psychology." Lawrence Erlbaum Associates: Hillsdale, NJ.
Beins, B. C. (1 992). Constancy and Change: Teaching as depicted in psychology journals. in Puente, A. E., Matthews, J. R., and Brewer, C. L. (eds.) Teaching Psychology in America: A History. Washington, D. C.: American Psychological Association.
Buskist, W., Cush, D., and DeGrandpre, R. J. (1991). The life and Times of PSI. Journal of Behavioral Education, 1, 215-234.
Caldwell, E. C. (1 985). Dangers of PSI. Teaching of Psychology, 12, 9 - 12.
Cumming, G. (1990) "The Introductory statistics course: Mixed student groups preferred to streamed." In Hartley, J. and McKeachie, W. J. (eds.) Teaching Psychology: A handbook: Readings from "Teaching of Psycholoay." Lawrence Erlbaum Associates: Hillsdale, N.J. Psychological Review, 17, 83-91.
Gallup, H. F. (1971). Problems in the implementation of a course in personalized instruction. Paper presented at "Personalized Instruction: a symposium in honor of Fred Keller," American Psychological Association Meeting, September 6, 1971. Reprinted in Sherman, J. G. (ed) (1974). PSI: Personalized system of instruction. Phillipines: W. A. Benjamin, Inc.
Gallup, H. F. (1977). Reply to Meek. Journal of Personalized Instruction, 2, 130-133. Reprinted in Sherman, J. G., Ruskin, R. S., and Semb, G. B. (eds.) (1982). The Personalized System of Instruction: 48 Seminal Papers. Lawrence, Kansas: TRI Publications.
Gallup, H. F. (1978). Review of Introduction to Psychology: A View of Behavior by Brown P. L. Journal of Personalized Instruction, 3, 50-55.
Gallup, H. F. and Warranch, H. R. (1978). Some potential problems with the commercialization of PSI materials. Paper presented at the Fourth National Conference on Personalized Instruction. Reprinted in Sherman, J. G., Ruskin, R. S., and Lazar, R. M. (eds.) Personalized .Instruction in Education Today. San Francisco: The San Francisco Press, Inc.
Halonen, J. S. (1992). "I was just lucky": an interview with model teacher Wilbert J. McKeachle. In Puente, A. E., Matthews, J. R., and Brewer, C. L. (eds.) Teaching Psychology in America: A History. Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association.
Hartley, J. and McKeachie, W. J. (eds.) (1990). Teaching Psycholociy: A handbook: Readings from "Teaching of Psychology." Lawrence Erlbaum Associates: Hillsdale, N.J.
Keller, F. S. (1 968) "Goodbye, Teacher. . ." Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 1, 79-89.
Keller, F. S. (1985). Lightning strikes twice. Teaching of Psychology, 12, 4 - 8.
Keller, F. S. (1993). "Friends and Foes of Education." Eastern Psychological Association Address.
Keller, F. S. and Koen, B. V. (Eds.) (1976). The Personalized System of Instruction: State of the Art 1976. A report to the Alfred 0. Sloan Foundation, prepared by Engineering Institutes, The University of Austin.
Keller, F. S. and Sherman, J. G. (1982). The PSI Handbook: Essays on Personalized Instruction. Lawrence, Kansas: TRI Publications.
Kulik, C.-L. C., Kulik, J., and Cohen, P. A. (1990). "Instructional technology and college teaching." In Hartley, J. and McKeachie, W. J. (eds.) Teaching Psychology: A handbook: Readings from "Teaching of Psychology." Lawrence Erlbaum Associates: Hillsdale, N.J.
Kulik, J., Kulik, C.-L. C., and Cohen, P. A. (1979). A meta-analysis of outcome studies of Keller's personalized system of instruction. American Psychologist, 34, 307-318.
McKeachie, W. J. (1974) The decline and fall of the laws of learning. Educational Researcher, 3, 7-11.
Meek, R. L. (1977). The traditional in non-traditional learning methods. Journal of Personalized Instruction, 2, 114-119. Reprinted in Sherman, J. G., Ruskin, R. S., and Semb, G. B. (eds.) (1982). The Personalized System of Instruction: 48 Seminal Papers. Lawrence, Kansas: TRI Publications.
Pittenger, D. J. (1992). A brief history ot the American Psychological Foundation's award for distinguished teachers of psychology. In Puente, A. E., Matthews, J. R., and Brewer, C. L. (eds.) Teaching Psychology in America: A History. Washington, D. C.: American Psychological Association.
Puente, A. E., Matthews, J. R., and Brewer, C. L. (eds.) (1992) Teaching Psychology in America: A History. Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association.
Reboy, L. M. and Semb, G. B. (1991) PSI and Critical Thinking: Compatibility or Irreconcilable Differences? Teaching of Psychology, 18, 212 - 214.
Sherman, J. G. (ed.) (1974). Personalized System of Instruction: 41 Germinal Papers. Phillipines: W. A. Benjamin, Inc.
Sherman, J. G., Ruskin, R. S., and Semb, G. B. (Eds.) (1982). The Personalized System of Instruction: 48 Seminal Papers. Lawrence, Kansas: TRI Publications.
Spencer, K. The psychology of educational technology and instructional media. (1988). Routledge & Kegan Paul, Inc.: London.