Abstract
Although previous research investigated whether explaining expectancy promotes text understanding, their results were inconsistent with some research reporting positive effects and others reporting no effects. The present study examined that beliefs about explanation moderate the effects of explaining expectancy on text comprehension. Participants in the experimental condition were all given the explaining expectancy before studying the text. On the other hand, participants in the control condition were not. Results showed that the effects of explaining expectancy differed depending on their knowledge-building tendency. With explaining expectancy, knowledge-building tendency predicted the scores of text comprehension. But, without explaining expectancy, knowledge-building tendency did not. Results suggested that explaining expectancy exercise an influence only if the learners have the beliefs that they need to elaborate or organize the materials for explanation.
