18.6 CONCLUSIONS

There are some conclusions we would draw from this review: 1. It appears that conditions models have a long history of interest in psychology, educational psychology, and instructional technology. This history illustrates work that may not be widely known among instructional technologists today; work that can be instructive as to the actual base and significance of the conditions approach. Perhaps we will see fewer erroneous statements in our literature about what is known regarding types of learning, learning hierarchies, and conditions of learning.

2. There appears to be continuing interest in this area, due to its utility in helping specify instructional strategies and also due to the sizable gaps and inconsistencies that exist in current formulations and research on and with them. We have described in this chapter many fruitful areas for further research.

3. We have reached a conclusion about the work of R. M. Gagné which we would like to share, and suggest that readers examine their own conclusions from reading. We find GagnCs work cast within so much that preceded it and which follows it to remain both dominating in its appeal and utility and, paradoxically, heavily flawed and in need of improvement. The utility and appeal of this work appears to derive greatly from the solid scholarship and cogent writing that Gagné brought to bear, as well as his willingness to change the fonnulation to keep up with changing times and new knowledge. Many of the gaps and flaws, in keeping with the paradox, appear to be a product of the very changes that he made to keep up with current interests. We believe those changes to be in the main beneficial, but see a clear need for systematic and rigorous scholarship on issues opened by those changes.

4. We still see utility in thinking of learning as more than one kind of thing, especially for practitioners. It is too easy, in the heat of practitioner's struggles, to slip to the assumption that all knowledge is declarative (as is so often seen in the learning outcomes statements of large-scale instructional systems) or all problem solving (as is so often assumed in the pronouncements of pundits and critics of public education), and, as a result, fail to consider either the vast arena of application of declarative knowledge or the multitude of prerequisites for problem solving. It is unhelpful to develop new systems of types of learning for the mere purpose of naming. Improvements in categorization schemes should be based on known differences in cognitive processing and required differences in external conditions.

5. There is substantial weakness in the tie from categories of learning to external conditions of learning. What is missing is the explication of the intemal conditions involved in acquisition of different kinds of learning. The research on transition from expert to novice and of artificial-intelligence research that attempts to describe knowledge of experts should be particularly fruitful in helping us fill this void. Perhaps this void is a result of failure to have a sufficient emphasis on qualitative research in our field.

6. There is research to support the conclusion that different external events of instruction lead to different kinds of learning, especially looking at the declarative/procedural level. What appears lacking is any systematic body of research directly on the central tenant, not just of conditions models but of practically anyone who would attempt to teach much less design instruction: What is the relationship between internal learner conditions and subsequent learning from instruction? Such a topic seems a far cry from studies that would directly inforrn designers as to procedures and techniques, yet such a great deal seems to hinge on that one question. With more insight into it, many quibbles and debates may disappear, and the work of translation into design principles may begin at a new level of efficacy.