Why can guessing before seeing an answer help, even when the guess is wrong?

Answer: It tunes attention to feedback

Errors imprint themselves — This is the fear behind errorless learning, and it can be true in some conditions if wrong answers are left uncorrected. But pretesting studies ask a different question: what happens when the learner soon sees feedback? A failed guess can make the correction more targeted. The mistake is useful only because the answer arrives.

It tunes attention to feedback ✓ — Right. A wrong guess can mark the mental search space before feedback appears, so the real answer lands on a prepared contrast. Richland, Kornell, and Kao found pretesting could enhance later learning in several experiments. It is not magic error worship; it is a way to make the correction more informative.

It rehearses the question — Rehearsing the question may help a little because it keeps the problem active. But pretesting studies point to something more specific than repetition: the failed search makes the later feedback land against a prepared expectation. If rehearsal were the whole story, simply rereading the prompt would do the same job. The useful part is the contrast between guess and correction.