ABSTRACT
In the past century we have achieved considerable progress in understanding how to design training so that students are capable of what Royer (1979) called "near transfer" of problem-solving skills. In near transfer, the prior learning of an interrelated set of skills facilitates the learning of new skills that are transferred and applied to a similar problem or context that is within the same domain of knowledge (Osgood, 1949; Singley & Anderson, 1989). This is the case, for example, when instruction in one computer programming language leads students to find it easier and quicker to learn a second programming language (e.g., Gadzella, Ginther, & Williamson, 1987). Yet, learning a programming language does not appear to result in the far transfer (Royer, 1979; Reder & Klatzky, 1994) ofprogramming skills beyond the domain of computer programming. That is, students who learn computer programming do not necessarily become more adept at foreign languages or systematic problem solving. This much more general transfer would presumably aid in the solving of novel problems or analyses either in a different or non-computer domain of knowledge (Lohman, 1986; Anderson, Reder & Simon, 1996).
