A group of education researchers has hypothesized that taking brief “microbreaks” (short pauses with no academic task) during a study session improves long-term retention of newly learned information by reducing mental fatigue. To evaluate this hypothesis, another research team assigned participants to study the same set of informational passages under one of two conditions: (1) participants studied for a fixed total time with a 1-minute microbreak after every 10 minutes of reading, or (2) participants studied for the same fixed total time with no scheduled breaks. All participants then took the same multiple-choice test about the passages 48 hours later.
Which finding from the study, if true, would most strongly support the researchers’ hypothesis?