This study aims to determine the relationships between mental effort and the use of learner controls while working with instructional software. Various versions of instructional software including control components were developed to examine this relationship. Twenty-four secondary school students participated in the study and studied with…

Process-Overlap Theory (POT) suggests that measures of cognitive abilities sample from sets of independent cognitive processes. These cognitive processes can be separated into domain-general executive processes, sampled by the majority of cognitive ability measures, and domain-specific processes, sampled only by measures within a certain domain.…

As a theory of skill acquisition, the instance theory of automatization posits that, after a period of training, algorithm-based performance is replaced by retrieval-based performance. This theory has been tested using alphabet-arithmetic verification tasks (e.g., is A + 4 = E?), in which the equations are necessarily solved by counting at the…

This study investigates the effects of four online vocabulary tasks on second language (L2) vocabulary acquisition among learners of different proficiency levels. While tasks are widely used to support L2 vocabulary learning, the efficacy of a task depends on the interplay between task and learner factors. Thus, choosing an appropriate task…

Drawing on dual-process theories of cognitive function, the degree to which spatial contiguity influences incidental learning outcomes was examined. It was hypothesized that spatial contiguity would mediate what was learned even in the absence of an explicit learning goal. To test this hypothesis, 149 adults completed a multimedia-related task…

Is consolidation needed to account for retroactive interference in free recall? Interfering mental activity during the retention interval of a memory task impairs performance, in particular if the interference occurs in temporal proximity to the encoding of the to-be-remembered (TBR) information. There are at least two rival theoretical accounts…

Intelligent Tutoring Systems authoring tools are highly complex educational software applications used to produce highly complex software applications (i.e. ITSs). How should our assumptions about the target users (authors) impact the design of authoring tools? In this article I first reflect on the factors leading to my original 1999 article on…

This study investigated visual statistical learning (VSL) in 24 deaf signers and 24 hearing non-signers. Previous research with hearing individuals suggests that SL mechanisms support literacy. Our first goal was to assess whether VSL was associated with reading ability in deaf individuals, and whether this relation was sustained by a link between…

Cognitive load theory (CLT) (Sweller 1988, 1998, 2010) provides us a guiding framework for designing instructional materials. CLT differentiates three subtypes of cognitive load: intrinsic, extraneous, and germane cognitive load. The three cognitive loads are theorized based on the number of simultaneously processed elements in working memory.…

Cognitive control, the ability to align our actions with goals or context, is largely absent in children under four. How then are preschoolers able to tailor their behavior to best match the situation? Learning may provide an alternative route to context-sensitive responding. This study investigated this hypothesis in the Dimensional Change Card…

In this article, we highlight the need for a precisely defined construct in score-based validation and discuss the contribution of cognitive theories to accurately and comprehensively defining the construct. We propose a framework for integrating cognitively based theoretical and empirical evidence to specify and evaluate the construct. We apply…

Background: In order to design appropriate environments for performance and learning of movement skills, physical educators need a sound theoretical model of the learner and of processes of learning. In physical education, this type of modelling informs the organisation of learning environments and effective and efficient use of practice time. An…

In 5 experiments, results showed that when participants are faced with materials embedding relations between both adjacent and nonadjacent elements, they learn exclusively the type of relations they had to actively process in order to meet the task demands, irrespective of the spatial contiguity of the paired elements. These results are consonant…

An examination of task analysis from several perspectives in order to identify some of its purposes and advantages reveals that, as the interest in learning theory has shifted from a predominately behavioral perspective to a more cognitive orientation, the purpose of task analysis has also shifted. Formerly the purpose of task analysis was to aid…

The proposed three-step strategy for research on human information processing--concept hierarchy analysis, analysis of example sets to teach relations among concepts, and analysis of problem sets to build a progressively larger schema for the problem space--may lead to practical procedures for instructional design and task analysis. Sixty-four…