Holmes, N. G., Olsen, J., Thomas, J. L., & Weiman, C. E. (2017). Value added or misattributed? A multi-institution study on the educational benefit of labs for reinforcing physics content. Physical Review Physics Education Research, 13.
This multi-institution study measured the effectiveness of introductory lab courses on teaching scientific content. The authors are from Departments of Physics at Cornell University, University of Washington, and Stanford University and the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of New Mexico. Although encompassing a broad range of student populations and instructional styles, the nine courses studied had two key things in common: the labs aimed to reinforce the content presented in lectures, and the labs were optional. Performance was compared between students who did and did not take the labs (with careful normalization for selection effects). Results show universally and precisely no added value to learning course content from taking the labs as measured by course exam performance. One explanation for this result is that the lab activities were dominated by following instructions and specified procedures. Although physics concepts were central to the thinking of the instructor they got little attention from the student carrying out the assigned activities. Alternative goals and instructional approaches that would make lab courses more educationally valuable include: open-ended activities; providing students with time, opportunity, and incentive to revise, troubleshoot, or explore; and shifting the emphasis of activities towards the quality of students’ process rather than the product they obtain.