Impact of Epistemological Beliefs on Hypertext Learning: A Pilot-Study

This explorative pilot-study investigated the relationship between epistemological beliefs, prior knowledge and selfregulated learning with a hierarchical hypertext. Students who varied in their epistemological beliefs and prior knowledge learned about the topic of genetic fingerprinting. Logfiles and questionnaire data were collected. Results indicate that both epistemological beliefs and prior knowledge are significantly associated with process data such as processing different hypertext parts and calibration to task demands, as well as with the learning outcome.