Effect of different levels of cognition and interactivity of adjunct question on individualized Web-based instruction

The purpose of this study was to examine the instructional relationship between the cognitive level of adjunct question type (fact vs. comprehension) and the type of student interactivity (Type 1: Associative processing with simple-click activity vs. Type 2: Associative and referential processing with drag-drop activity) on tests measuring different instructional objectives. 106 undergraduate students were randomly assigned to four treatment groups. Immediately after interacting with their respective instructive materials they completed three individual criterion measures. Data was analyzed via a 2x2 ANOVA. Item analysis was used to design and position questions in the instructional unit where students experienced difficulty in acquiring the designated content being assessed by the criterion measures.;Analysis of the data indicated that an insignificant interaction existed between cognitive levels of the questions and interaction type on each of the criterion measures. There was a significant main effect with the type 2 treatment achieving significantly higher scores than the type 1 treatment on both the identification/terminology and comprehension criterion measures for both types of questions (fact and comprehension).;Results obtained in this study indicate that not all types of interactivity are equally effective in facilitating acquirement of different types of educational objectives and that insignificant differences in treatment were found to exist between the cognitive level of questions on the different criterion measures.