Abstract
In research on learning with animations compared to static pictures usually very short and narrowly defined topics are chosen. However, in school contexts such topics are often extended by additional information (i.e., information that is related to a given topic, but not essential for this topic). In the current study, that took place in a school context, it was investigated which role additional information would play when learning with animations compared to static pictures. It was hypothesized that there would be a beneficial effect of the animation, that additional information would impede learning the original topic and that the beneficial effect of the animation compared to the static picture would be even more pronounced when additional information is presented compared to when no additional information is given. A 2 × 2 between-subject design, with visualization format (animation vs. static picture) and additional information (present vs. absent) as independent variables, was used (N = 199 high school students). Learning outcomes were analysed by means of a focal contrast analysis that corresponded to the stated hypotheses. Results revealed that the hypotheses were not met for factual knowledge tasks, but for transfer tasks: Additional information hindered learning, and the advantage of the animation over the static picture was more pronounced when additional information was presented. However, it should be noted that learners receiving additional information performed better on questions about the additional information than learners without additional information. Implications of these results are discussed.
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Notes
This reasoning may be at first glance supported by the subjective ratings of content complexity, difficulty and effort. However, this type of evidence should be treated very cautiously, since we did not measure cognitive load directly after the presentation of additional information, but only once after the learning phase. Moreover, the conditions with additional information took more time. Due to this confound, it may be the case that these results do not reflect higher cognitive load, but, for instance, the invested additional time (cf. Van Gog et al. 2012).
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Funding
This work was supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG) under grant agreement KU 3160/2–1. We would like to thank Sabrina Navratil for coordinating and conducting this study, Tanja Tu and Christina Dickers for helping to conduct this study and Dr. Johann Jacoby for giving advice on the contrast analyses.
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Kühl, T., Münzer, S. The moderating role of additional information when learning with animations compared to static pictures. Instr Sci 47, 659–677 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-019-09498-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-019-09498-x