Do Intelligent Tutoring Systems Benefit K–12 Students in the United States? A Meta-Analytic Evaluation of Treatment Effect Heterogeneity

• In Event: Consortium of State and Regional Educational Research Associations Distinguished Paper Session 2

Abstract

As the access to computers by U.S. K-12 students has increased in recent years, so has the potential for students to benefit from intelligent tutoring systems (ITS). Therefore, it is important to understand in which conditions U.S. students have benefited from ITS. This meta-analysis evaluated the heterogeneity of ITS effects across studies focusing on elementary, middle, and high schools in the U.S. Overall, there was a significant positive effect size of ITS on U.S. K-12 students’ learning outcomes (g=0.322, SE=0.111, p=0.010). ITS used with middle school students (g= 0.357) produced a significantly lower effect compared with other grades (g=0.409). Also, the effects of studies that did not target disadvantaged populations (g=0.402) were significantly higher than those of studies with disadvantaged population targeting (g=0.258).

Authors

• Walter L. Leite, University of Florida

• Huibin Zhang, University of Tennessee

• Shibani G. Rana, University of Florida

• Yide Hao, University of Florida

• Amber Danielle Hatch, University of Florida

• Lingchen Kong, University of Florida

• Huan Kuang, Florida State University