In our everyday life, we often need to anticipate the potential occurrence of events and their consequences. In this context, the way we represent contingencies can determine our ability to adapt to the environment. However, it is not clear how agents encode and organize available knowledge about the future to react to possible states of the…

Decorative pictures, which make a learning text aesthetically appealing rather than provide information, have been predominantly found to impair learning by an increase of learning-irrelevant cognitive processes. Recent research, however, indicates that this effect is moderated by various factors. On the basis of cognitive-affective theories and…

This research examined whether the informational advantage of an animation over a static picture (and over no visualizations as a control condition) can be compensated by presenting the information in the text that constitutes this informational advantage. In addition, it was investigated whether learners' spatial abilities acted as a compensator…

This study examines differences in English listening comprehension, cognitive load, and learning behaviour between outdoor ubiquitous learning and indoor computer-assisted learning. An experimental design, employing a pretest-posttest control group is employed. Randomly assigned foreign language university majors joined either the experimental…

This study investigated the redundancy effect on older and younger persons' cognitive performance in a caregiver video training. Participants (N = 92) were recruited from one research-intensive university and three senior centers in a midsize city in the western United States. The mixed within- and between-subjects design was used. Participants…

MOOCs are open, online courses that use information technologies to enhance the learning experience and attract various people from the entire world. The current study uses the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), as well as personal characteristics such as learning strategies, cognitive appraisal, and Kuhlthau's (1991) model of information seeking…

Previous research has demonstrated that people preferentially remember reputational information that is emotionally incongruent to their expectations, but it has left open the question of the generality of this effect. Three conflicting hypotheses were proposed: (a) The effect is restricted to information relevant to reciprocal social exchange.…

This study intends to solve the problem that schools in Taiwan lack of the equipment for color management and inspection instruction and seek ways to improve learning results and reduce cognitive load. The researchers developed 3D courseware for color management and inspection through a research and development process. To further scrutinize the…

The present study aimed to examine the nature of the working memory and general cognitive ability deficits experienced by university students with a specific reading comprehension deficit. A total of 32 university students with poor reading comprehension but average word-reading skills and 60 age-word-matched controls with no comprehension…

In recent years, gloss presentation format or the location where a gloss appears with respect to its related target word has received renewed attention. Research suggested that different gloss presentation formats could have differential effects on reading comprehension and/or vocabulary learning. This study hypothesized that the effectiveness of…

Poor multimedia comprehenders suffer from a decreased ability in comprehending complex textual and pictorial materials (Maki & Maki, 2002). This deficit will lead to an overloaded working memory and consequently decreased performance (Carretti, Borella, Cornoldi, & De Beni, 2009). The purpose of this research study was to examine the effects of…

Australian, Iranian and Portuguese university students ("n"?=?967) completed the University Students Depression Inventory (USDI) in English, Persian and Portuguese languages, respectively. A series of MANOVA analyses were used to examine differences in depression symptoms as an effect of the country and demographic variables.…

Although ubiquitous learning enhances students' access to learning materials, it is crucial to find out which media delivery modes produce the best results for English listening comprehension. The present study examined the effect of media delivery mode (sound and text vs. sound) on English listening comprehension and cognitive load. Participants…

The purpose of the two experiments was to investigate the potential effects of different types of visualizations and self-explanation prompts on learning human cardiovascular system in a multimedia environment. In Experiments 1 and 2, 70 and 44 college students were randomly assigned to one of the four conditions in a 2 × 2 factorial design with…

Although ubiquitous learning enhances students' access to learning materials, it is crucial to find out which media presentation modes produce the best results for English listening comprehension. The present study examined the effect of media presentation mode (sound and text versus sound) on English listening comprehension and cognitive load.…