Feedback is most effective when it arrives close in time to the action it responds to. Delayed feedback requires the learner to reconstruct the context, which is cognitively expensive and error-prone.

The implication for software: immediate error messages, inline validation, live preview. The implication for education: frequent low-stakes assessment rather than infrequent high-stakes exams.

The limit: feedback that arrives too immediately can prevent learners from generating their own error-correction processes. Some delay — enough to force an attempt at self-evaluation — is optimal.

Related: [[the-testing-effect]], [[desirable-difficulties]]