The first courses reported in the literature were language courses, but other subjects were also taught with either Suggestopedia, Superlearning or SALT on a non-experimental basis. Results were not compared with a control group, but reported naturalistically as they had been observed. Teaching was generally carried out in favourable conditions.
Examples of such studies are Herr (1978, 1979) who taught German to college students in the U.S.A., Gassner-Roberts (1982) who taught German to a mixed group including teenagers, students and working adults in Australia, Landhal (1982) who reports on Russian being taught to teachers in Sweden, and Haines (1982) who taught mathematics to gifted fourth grade children in the U.S.A. All these studies used the SALT model, and the observations reported support Herr's (1978:197) conclusions:
SALT offers the teaching profession in total � not just language teachers � the opportunity of accelerating student learning, of increasing the quantity and quality of learning, and leading to greater student satisfaction and self-esteem.
A further study which supports Herr's (1978) findings was reported by Klockner (1984).
In this study Indochinese refugees in the U.S.A. were taught English suggestopedically. It is interesting to note that the students liked the baroque music used, "and that it
contributed to a relaxed atmosphere in the class, even though it did not carry the peaceful connotations which Westerners associate with it." (p.74)
Haines (1982) and Gassner-Roberts (1982) also report that students displayed a more positive attitude towards the subject than is usually observed.
These findings are supported by Cooter (1986) who reports on a five-year study using various forms of SALT adaptations in the teaching of English grammar and punctuation rules at a community college in the U.S.A.. Not only does he report consistently higher achievement than can normally be expected in these classes, with scores being within the range 80% to 91%, but he also mentions consistently better attitudes towards the subject than usual. It is interesting to note that student numbers in the 13 classes taught over five years ranged from 19 to 69 without significant differences in achievement. This suggests that classes do not need to be small for the method to be effective. There were also large differences in drop-out rates over the years in the SALT classes ranging from 0% to 49%
and not related to achievement, which suggests that Accelerative Learning does not effect drop-out rates in this environment.
There are also a small number of studies which support Herr's (1978) findings in the secondary school environment. Stockwell (1985) taught English in Liechtenstein using Suggestopedia, Wagner (1985) English in West Germany using Superlearning and Cureau (1983) English in France using his own adaptation of Suggestopedia. No control groups were available in any of these experiments. Stockwell taught in favourable conditions with small classes, pleasant surroundings and intensive teaching, while the other two studies were carried out in the natural school environment. The ages of subjects ranged from 12 to 18. It is interesting to note that although these studies were conducted in three different countries with three different versions of Accelerative Learning and in different environments, the observations made by the researchers here, too, focussed on the same elements mentioned by Herr (1978) above. These observations again suggest that favourable conditions are not necessary for the method to be effective.
This is partly supported by Schiffler (1986b) who found that the physical environment in suggestopedic teaching has little effect compared to the facilitative effect of music.
Intensive conditions, however, were found to be important. Schiffler (1986b:128) concluded that the "positive influence of baroque music is essentially reduced in extensive teaching of 4 lessons a week as is usual in schools".
The effect of Accelerative Learning has also been investigated in the primary school environment. The longest continuous study carried out in a primary school in Europe was conducted in Austria over two and one half years (Beer 1982). Two first grades and two trained teachers, originally under the supervision of Lozanov, took part in the experiment.
The major advantages of Suggestopedia reported by Beer (1978:37) were that "a
considerably larger amount of materials was covered, that achievement was quantitatively and qualitatively better, that children became increasingly more creative and that
aggressiveness occurred less frequently and in a reduced form". Beer goes on to report some disadvantages of the method. These are that "the approach is still at an experimental stage, which means uncertainty and extra work for teachers. They are required to produce their own materials and mobilise all their resources in order to do justice to the
programme". The most important question which Beer (1978:37) raises is "whether this quickly acquired material will be retained over long periods of time or will soon be forgotten".
Another long-term study in the primary school environment was carried out in the U.S.A.
by Prichard and Taylor (1980) over five years. Subjects participating were at least one year behind grade level on the Stanford Diagnostic Reading Comprehension Subtest and had Intelligence Quotient (I.Q.) scores of at least 70. They were chosen from 40
elementary schools in Georgia and grade levels ranged from grade 2 to grade 7.
Treatment consisted of an adapted Superlearning model. Prichard and Taylor (1980:78) report that the treatment was "most effective with students who were near average in I.Q., had already acquired considerable vocabulary and were old enough to consider
relaxation, imagery and drama a pleasant diversion from 'regular' instruction". They report the treatment as least effective "with young (2nd grade) lower I.Q. students, some of whom never quite seemed to catch on to what was expected of them in the relaxation sessions or to participate fully in the drama". The average gain in reading comprehension
per month was reported as 4:1 for the younger children which suggests that the gain in reading comprehension score for the experimental children was four times higher than that of the children taught in normal classes. For the older children a ratio of 16:1 was reported. Although the authors were encouraged by the large gain scores recorded, they claim that the gains achieved by the low I.Q. students were still not enough to bring them up to grade level and to maintain them there. It is interesting to note that other teachers at the school commented that three quarters of the children did not read as well in other classes as they did in "the concentrated positive-suggestive atmosphere" in which they were taught. (p.79)
Although the above studies lend some support to some of the claims made by Lozanov, real comparisons with traditionally taught courses cannot be made because of the absence of a viable control group in all these studies. There are some studies, however, in which such comparisons are made. Dröbner (1986), for example taught French to a group of 15 volunteer students at a Fachhochschule [Institute of Technology] in West Germany.
Superlearning was used as the method of instruction and the study was carried out over four weekends and 40 hours. Results were compared with a group with the same number of students which had been taught over the same amount of time but in the normal two hours per week. No other information is given about this 'control group' except that a different text was used. Dröbner reports that the experimental group learnt three times as many lexical items (1200) as the 'control group' and on the basis of these results further calculations are performed which show that up to 12 times as much material could be taught per semester if Superlearning were used as a method of instruction. The way in which such a claim is to be interpreted is unclear. No information about the functional use of those items by the students is given. It is quite possible that while the 'control group' learnt only one third of the amount of lexical items, students in this group functioned more adequately across the four language skills: speaking, reading, writing and listening.
Dröbner's study gives information only about recall ability which, although important in language learning, can be considered as the least difficult task.
An even more surprising comparison was made by Philipov (1978). In this study the achievement of a group of six volunteer students taught Bulgarian suggestopedically for 120 hours was compared with a group of ten students selected at random from a group which had been taught Russian traditionally and in the normal university programme for 360 hours. Although it can be argued that at a beginning level language courses tend to have similar objectives, and that proficiency in closely related languages may be comparable through standardised tests, this study still has the flavour of comparing apples to oranges since we have no information about the 'control group'. Proficiency was rated independently by two native speakers of the respective languages on a 1-8 scale especially designed for the purpose. While the Bulgarian judges gave identical ratings, resulting in a median of 5.75, the Russian judges did not give a single identical rating, resulting in medians of 4.5 and 4. The consistent discrepancy in the Russian ratings poses a question about the reliability of the rating instrument.
Conclusions - Non-experimental studies. Studies conducted on a non-experimental basis appear to support Lozanov's major claims. The majority of studies here claim that large
volumes of materials were being taught, higher achievement than usual was attained and affective variables were being positively influenced as a result of the use of Accelerative Learning. However, just as in Lozanov's case, comparisons with traditionally taught courses cannot be made since viable control groups were not established in these studies.
Although the studies of both Philipov (1978) and Dröbner (1986) are interesting in terms of the data which is reported on a naturalistic basis, caution has to be taken about
interpreting claims made in such studies related to achievement and time saving, since the control groups used in both cases were convenient samples rather than viable groups of comparison. We do not know how the control group would have performed had it been set up as part of the experiment. In both cases it may have been more conservative to conclude that large amounts of materials (1200 and1800 lexical items respectively) may be taught in a relatively short time in intensive conditions. In the light of Schiffler's (1986b) observations, an important variable in these studies may have been the
condensed intensive teaching conditions. It would be interesting, therefore, to replicate these studies and compare students' performance in all four language skills with a control group which had been taught in identical conditions using a different method. A study which does almost all of this (Mignault 1979) will be reported below.
Naturally it is difficult to control the environment outside a laboratory and in studies involving interaction between human beings. Using comparable control groups in a comparable environment, however, is the first step to more controlled research in an educational setting. It is most important that the experimental group is not made up of specially selected, highly motivated volunteer students whose achievement is then compared to a group of students taken out of the normal teaching environment where different aims and objectives are set, different materials are used and teaching time is not intensive. We will therefore now look at experimental and quasi-experimental studies in which viable control groups were used as a means of comparison.