Overlearning refers to practicing newly acquired skills beyond the point of initial mastery. The term is also often used to refer to the pedagogical theory that this form of practice leads to automaticity or other beneficial consequences.
Early studies
thumb|Data from Ebbinghaus showing recall falling over time
Memory researcher Hermann Ebbinghaus performed classical overlearning studies in the late 1890s. He noticed that memory for learned material decreased over time, following the line of a "forgetting curve". Ebbinghaus recognized that lists of nonsense syllables became more difficult to recall over time, and some lists required more review time to regain 100% recall. He defined overlearning as the number of repetitions of material after which it can be recalled with 100% accuracy. The meta-analysis included 15 studies. These 15 studies tested overlearning effects on physical and cognitive tasks. Both types of task showed an effect of overlearning. The effect size for physical tasks was smaller than the effect size for cognitive tasks. Overlearning may be more useful in instances when learners only need short-term retention of the material.