Allison J. Jaeger, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor

St. John's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

Ph.D., 2015 Univerrsity of Illinois at Chicago

Educational Background

Post-Doctoral Fellow 2015-2018, Temple University, Spatial Intelligence and Learning Center
Ph.D., 2015, University of Illinois at Chicago, Cognitive Psychology
M.A., 2012, University of Illinois at Chicago, Cognitive Psychology
B.A., 2007, University of Illinois at Chicago, Applied Psychology

Dr. Jaeger received her M.A. and Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from the University of Illinois at Chicago and then went on to complete a postdoctoral research fellowship in the Spatial Intelligence and Learning Center at Temple University in Philadelphia. Dr. Jaeger's research interests are situated at the intersection of education and cognitive psychology. Her research explores how individual differences in cognitive capacities (such as spatial thinking) impact STEM learning, and how learning materials and instructions can be designed to support learning for all types of students. She also investigates how these same materials and instructions can impact students' metacognitive monitoring accuracy. Through her research, Dr. Jaeger has developed collaborations with researchers and educators in Psychology, Computer Science, Education, and STEM domains including Geoscience and Chemistry. She has coauthored numerous peer reviewed publications and book chapters and has presented at over 40 national and international conferences. In her future research, Dr. Jaeger plans to investigate the impact of using worked examples to support learning in undergraduate science classes.

Research Interests

Dr. Jaeger's research interests are situated at the intersection of education and cognitive psychology. Her research explores how individual differences in cognitive capacities (such as spatial thinking) impact STEM learning, and how learning materials and instructions can be designed to support learning for all types of students. She also investigates how these same materials and instructions can impact students' metacognitive monitoring accuracy. Through her research, Dr. Jaeger has developed collaborations with researchers and educators in Psychology, Computer Science, Education, and STEM domains including Geoscience and Chemistry.

Brudzinski, M. R., Jaeger, A. J., & Shipley, T. F. (2019). Challenges in making meaning from Ground Motion Visualizations: The role of geoscience knowledge in interpreting dynamic spatiotemporal patterns. Seismological Research Letters, 90, 1692-1701. DOI: 10.1785/0220180289

Jarosz, A. F., & *Jaeger, A. J. (2019). Inconsistent operations: A weapon of math disruption. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 33, 124 – 138. DOI: 10.1002/acp.3471

McLaughlin, J. A., Lombardi, D.,..., Jaeger, A. J., & Shipley, T. F. (2018). What’s hidden beneath? Using spatial sketching and feedback to help deepen students’ understanding of Earth’s subsurface. The Science Teacher, 54, 54 – 60.

Carbonell-Carrera, C., Jaeger, A. J., & Shipley, T. F. (2018). 2D cartography training: Has the time come for a paradigm shift? International Journal of Geo-Information, 7, 197. DOI: 10.3390/ijgi7050197

Jaeger, A. J., Velazquez, M., Dawdanow, A., & Shipley, T. (2018). Sketching and summarizing to reduce memory for seductive details in science text. Journal of Educational Psychology, 110, 899 – 916. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000254

Ryker, K., Jaeger, A. J., Brande, S., Guereque, M., Libarkin, J., & Shipley, T. F. (2018). Research on cognitive domain in geoscience learning: Temporal and spatial reasoning. In K. St. John (Ed.), Community Framework for Geoscience Education Research. National Association of Geoscience Teachers. DOI: 10.25885/ger_framework/7

Wiley, J., Jaeger, A. J., & Griffin, T. D. (2018). Effects of task instructions on comprehension of multiple documents in history and science. In J. L. G. Braasch, I. Bråten, and M. T. McCrudden (Eds.) Handbook of Multiple Source Use (pp. 341-361). New York, NY: Routledge.

Wiley, J., Jaeger, A. J., Taylor, A. R., & Griffin, T. D. (2017). When analogies harm: The effects of analogies and valid cues on the metacomprehension of science text. Learning and Instruction, 55, 113-123. DOI: 10.1016/j.learninstruc.2017.10.001

Jaeger, A. J., Shipley, T. F., & Reynolds, S. J. (2017). The roles of working memory and cognitive load in geoscience learning. Journal of Geoscience Education, 65(4), 506-518. DOI: 10.5408/16-209.1

Wiley, J., Hastings, P., Blaum, D., Jaeger, A. J., Hughes, S., Wallace, P., Griffin, T. D., & Britt, M. A. (2017). Different approaches to assessing the quality of explanations following a multiple-document inquiry activity in science. International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education, 27: 758. DOI: 10.1007/s40593-017-0138-z

Wiley, J., Griffin, T. D., Jaeger, A. J., Jarosz, A. F., Cushen, P. J., & Thiede, K. W. (2016). Improving metacomprehension accuracy in an undergraduate course context. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 22, 393-405. DOI: 10.1037/xap0000096

Jaeger, A. J., Wiley, J., & Moher, T. (2016). Leveling the playing field: Grounding learning with embedded simulations in geoscience. Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications, 1:23. DOI: 10.1186/s41235-016-0026-3

Jaeger, A. J., Taylor, A. R., & Wiley, J. (2016). When, and for whom, analogies help: The role of spatial skills and interleaved presentation. Journal of Educational Psychology, 108, 1121 – 1139. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000121

Sanchez, C. A., & Jaeger, A. J. (2015). If it’s hard to read, it changes how long you do it: Reading time as an explanation for perceptual fluency effects on judgment. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 22, 206-211. DOI: 10.3758/s13423-014-0658-6

Jaeger, A. J., & Wiley, J. (2015). Reading an analogy can cause the illusion of comprehension. Discourse Processes, 52, 376 - 405. DOI: 10.1080/0163853X.2015.1026679

Jaeger, A. J., & Wiley, J. (2014). Do illustrations help or harm metacomprehension accuracy? Learning & Instruction, 34, 58-73. DOI:10.1016/j.learninstruc.2014.08.002

Wiley, J., Sanchez, C. A., & Jaeger, A. J. (2014). The individual differences in working memory capacity principle in multimedia learning. In R. Mayer (Ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning (2nd ed., pp. 598-619). New York: Cambridge University Press. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9781139547369.029

Wiley, J., Ash, I. K., Sanchez, C. A., & Jaeger, A. J. (2011). Clarifying readers' goals for learning from expository science texts. In M.T. McCrudden, J. Magliano, and G. Schraw, (Eds.) Text relevance and learning from text (pp. 353-374). Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.

Courses Taught at St. John’s University

Graduate Courses

PSY 603: Inferential Statistics
PSY 650: History and Systems in Psychology

Undergraduate Courses

PSY 3270: Experimental Psychology of Learning
PSY 2030: Statistical Methods for the Social Sciences