{
  "schema_version": 1,
  "id": "prequestions-targeted-learning-boundary-2025",
  "canonical_url": "https://brali-lifeos.github.io/evidence/prequestions-targeted-learning-boundary-2025/",
  "json_url": "https://brali-lifeos.github.io/evidence/prequestions-targeted-learning-boundary-2025/index.json",
  "decision": "propose-protocol",
  "decision_label": "Protocol candidate",
  "reviewed_at": "2026-09-15",
  "reviewed_by": "Brali Evidence Reviewer",
  "source": {
    "title": "The Effect of Prequestions on Learning: A Multilevel Meta-Analysis",
    "url": "https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-025-10075-7",
    "type": "meta-analysis",
    "doi": "10.1007/s10648-025-10075-7",
    "citation_text": "King-Shepard QW, Walker J, Nokes-Malach TJ, Carpenter SK, Fraundorf SH. Educational Psychology Review. 2025;37:115.",
    "study_design": "Multilevel meta-analysis of the prequestion literature examining learning of prequestioned and non-prequestioned content across variations in learning event, participant sample, and assessment conditions.",
    "population": "Learners represented across the studies included in the meta-analysis; the practical protocol is intentionally population-neutral and does not convert subgroup findings into a universal dose.",
    "intervention_or_exposure": "Questions attempted before an educational activity, compared with conditions without those prequestions; some study conditions also provided feedback.",
    "outcomes": [
      "Learning of prequestioned information",
      "Learning of non-prequestioned information"
    ]
  },
  "supported_claim": "Prequestions can improve later learning of the specific information they target. The meta-analysis reported g = 0.66 for prequestioned information and g = 0.01 for non-prequestioned information; feedback alongside prequestions was associated with stronger targeted learning.",
  "unsupported_or_overstated_claims": [
    "Prequestions improve learning of the entire lesson.",
    "Any question asked before learning will be beneficial.",
    "There is one evidence-backed optimal number of prequestions.",
    "A wrong first answer is itself sufficient without later exposure or correction.",
    "Prequestions replace retrieval practice, practice problems, or feedback after learning."
  ],
  "limitations": [
    "The average benefit is specific to prequestioned information rather than a broad benefit to all content.",
    "The meta-analysis does not establish one universal question count, timing rule, or content format.",
    "Effect sizes summarize heterogeneous studies and do not guarantee the same result for an individual learning session."
  ],
  "target_hack_ids": [
    "prequestions-before-learning"
  ],
  "target_protocol_ids": [
    "brali:prequestions-before-learning"
  ],
  "risk_flags": [],
  "notes": "Editorial action: publish a new Skill Sprint protocol because no prequestion/pretesting surface was found in the canonical index or override layer. Make the target-versus-nontarget boundary prominent."
}