Does Being Able to Choose a Representation Foster Knowledge of Statistical Information?
If people who can choose between representations actually succeeded in choosing the representation that they understand better, they should perform better when confronted with knowledge questions compared with people who randomly received either of the representations, and this should hold true for both individuals who choose graphical and individuals who choose numerical representations. Previous research has studied whether people better understand formats they preferred and found mixed results. While some studies found that preferences were unrelated to knowledge,However, all of these conclusions were based on correlational results. In addition, in most studies, participants provided their preference ratings for all representations, these ratings did not have any consequences, and they were provided only after working with multiple different formats. However, letting people work with all representations before choosing would not be a feasible solution for everyday medical decision making. In sum, to the best of our knowledge, there is no study that has directly tested whether providing the opportunity to choose a representation prior to a knowledge task poses a promising approach to improve knowledge of medical information.