Active recall strategies associated with

academic achievement in young adults: A

Background
Effective learning strategies are crucial to the development of academic skills and
information retention, especially in post secondary education where increasingly
complex subjects are explored. Active recall-based strategies have been identified as
particularly effective for long-term learning. This systematic review investigates the
effectiveness of various active recall-based learning strategies for improving academic
performance and self-efficacy in higher education students.

Methods
A systematic review of peer-reviewed articles was conducted with a priori criteria by
searching PubMed, ScienceDirect, JSTOR, PsycInfo, and Web of Science databases.
Search results were screened/extracted and reconciled by two independent authors with
the use of a piloted screening tool. Included studies were assessed for quality and risk of
bias using the GRADE Quality Assessment Tool for Quantitative Studies. Three
overarching study strategies were extracted for further investigation including
flashcards, practice testing or retrieval practice, and concept mapping. Within each
category, three additional unique search strings were searched, screened, and extracted.
A qualitative analysis of the studies was provided.

Results
Among the appraised articles, flashcards were found to be popular and correlated with
higher GPA and test scores. Self-testing, retrieval practice, and concept mapping were
also effective but under-utilized. Concept mapping was found to boost student
confidence.

Conclusion
Active recall strategies exhibit promise for effective learning and additional research in
these developing field can support academic pursuits.
Introduction
In the past decade, academic institutions have gradually integrated technological
advancements to improve educational outcomes. In 2014, 80 % of elementary schools in
Ontario had integrated the use of computers in the classroom, starting from
kindergarten (People for Education, 2019). As of 2019, 33 % of elementary schools and
66 % of secondary schools in Ontario encourage students to bring their own devices to
school to use within the classroom as a part of their learning (People for Education,
2019). Despite this increase in technology use within the classroom, educators and
students alike struggled with the sudden shift to online learning as a result of the
COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, 72.7 % of educators were worried about supporting their
students to be successful with the change to online learning as a result of the pandemic
(Canadian Teachers' Federation, 2021). As a result, there has been a push to better
explore and integrate digital tools within the present day learning environment post
pandemic, with there being significant developments in formal schooling systems to
integrate digital tools with hopes of improving learning outcomes and academic
performance.
However, the underlying basis of one's academic capacity is intrinsic motivation, which
is an individual's internalized interest driving their desire to achieve (Chaudhuri, 2020).
Intrinsic motivation is considered the best factor in estimating success as it impacts
productivity, performance and learning persistence (Augustyniak et al., 2016). In
educational contexts, students with higher levels of intrinsic motivation exhibit higher
levels of achievement in school (Augustyniak et al., 2016). Moreover, intrinsic
motivation has been found to be positively associated with university
GPA, r = 0.14, p < 0.01, and negatively associated with a student's intention to drop
out, r = −0.34, p < 0.001 (Messerer et al., 2023). Despite the vast implementation of
technology in educational environments, there has been a significant gap in the
literature investigating the specific outcomes of digital tools and intrinsic motivation.
In addition to intrinsic motivation, a student's approach to studying greatly depended
on their efficiency and method of learning. Specifically, students who studied by
highlighting notes, re-reading notes, or other methods with lower requirement for call-
back of information were categorized as passive studiers which often rendered less
effective in information retrieval and internalization. In contrast, those who studied
with active recall entailed using tools such as flashcards, mind-maps, and other
approaches which required drawing previously learned information from scratch.
Regardless of their approach, many students have reported using technological
advancement as part of their routine whether it may be on their computer or easily
accessible through their mobile devices. Part of the technology integrated into the
classroom involves the use of productivity applications (apps). A productivity app is a
mobile or online-based application that aims to make various daily tasks more efficient
for its users (Azfar et al., 2017). These apps may exhibit functions such as scheduling
features (i.e., to-do lists, calendars, reminders) (Azfar et al., 2017). As such, they are
useful for school, work, or personal purposes, and their importance lies in the flexibility
of their features and their ability to adapt to each individual's unique needs.
Additionally, these productivity apps allow individuals to track their own progress better
through visualization of their progress. Since visualization and constant monitoring of
progress increases chances of achieving goals, the use of productivity apps in
educational contexts can help improve student educational outcomes, d + = 0.40
(Harkin et al., 2016). The metric for determining the apps' usefulness could include
measuring the effects it has on the intrinsic motivation of the user (through likert scales
demonstrated from past studies), and whether the app provides the individual with
inherent satisfaction rather than a separable consequence (Oudeyer and Kaplan, 2007).
While research is still in its infancy, present data suggests that these app features do
have an impact on the user's motivation and productivity. For instance, a study
examining the impact of mobile learning apps on educational motivation in nursing
students found a significant correlation between intrinsic motivation and improvement
in test scores following the use of the application, r (179) = 0.15 (Li et al., 2018). In
another study, a mobile learning app was designed to collect user data to investigate
usage of its features and subsequent effectiveness. Following the students' use of the app
to learn/practice the academic material, the post-test scores for the experimental group
were 2.27 points significantly higher than the post test scores of the control groups (Jou
et al., 2016).
However, present literature is still significantly limited in its coverage of specific app
features and the effects of combining multiple features into one app. For example, an
environmental scan noted that the calendar function in most productivity apps is not as
effective (Newton, 2016; Dhaliwal et al., 2021). Instead, calendar apps that show the
usage of time by individuals throughout the day may be more effective since it can help
individuals better visualize how they spend their time and create a schedule using this
information (Newton, 2016; Dhaliwal et al., 2021). Despite this, there have not been any
studies exploring the effectiveness of this type of calendar and its impact on learning
motivation. Additionally, the same environmental scan also notes that students prefer
when gamification is delivered by teachers rather than productivity apps and when
traditional learning is delivered by productivity apps rather than teachers (Vogel et al.,
2006; Dhaliwal et al., 2021). Considering this, gamification should not be a feature that
is incorporated into productivity apps if used for self learning. Ultimately, this highlights
the need to explore the features of different productivity apps together to determine how
to combine these features effectively.
This systematic review aims to determine whether the use of productivity apps increases
intrinsic motivation within students to engage further in their learning and educational
experience. These productivity app features can then be integrated based on their
effectiveness into Felicity, an app designed to improve motivation for individuals within
academia and the professional workplace.