Two experiments were conducted, the purpose of which was to investigate the direct effects of questioning. In experiment one, 240 sophomores, juniors, and seniors from a small town high school read one of two versions of a 550-word passage describing the social behavior of the army ant. The subjects then took either a verbatim or paraphrase quiz, either immediately after reading the passage or after a 20-minute filled delay. In experiment two, 422 freshmen from a suburban high school read the army ant passage and then completed a verbatim quiz, a paraphrase quiz, a verbatim quiz twice, a paraphrase quiz twice, a verbatim quiz followed by a paraphrase quiz, or a paraphase quiz followed by a verbatim quiz. The results indicated that taking a quiz significantly enhances performance on a delayed test. Performance was consistently higher on the verbatim than on the paraphrase forms of the quizzes and tests. Fitting the data well was a theory which assumes that a verbatim question is best at evoking retrieval of phonologically coded information in short term memory, and that a paraphrase question is best at instigating transfer of the information into long term, semantic memory. (WR)