Knowledge of Conference Objectives and Effect Upon Learning

Abstract

To determine whether knowledge of instructional objectives in an adult education program assists the participants to attain these objectives, randomly arranged groups of conference attendees were given three treatments: immediately prior to the conference, group A was provided with the instructional objectives in be havioral form; group B with a general orientation to the program; and group C with a pretest (in order to determine whether there was a change in the behavior under consideration during the conference). Upon the conclusion of the conference, all groups were given a posttest. The hypothesis that the group that was given behaviorally stated objectives would do significantly better on the criterion test than group B was upheld at the .05 signifi cance level. Additional hypotheses are suggested concerning ways in which adult educators may usefully employ behavioral objec tives in program planning and administration.