Moderating the seductive details effect in multimedia learning with note‐taking

Although the seductive details effect, a phenomenon where interesting but irrelevant pictures impede comprehension, is well documented, studies examining ways of moderating its detrimental impact on learning remain few. The present study examined the effect of note‐taking on the seductive details ef...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:British journal of educational technology 2017-11, Vol.48 (6), p.1380-1389
Main Authors: Wang, Zhe, Sundararajan, Narayankripa, Adesope, Olusola O., Ardasheva, Yuliya
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Attention Control
Cognitive Processes
Comparative Analysis
Difficulty Level
Educational technology
Foreign Countries
Learning
Learning Strategies
Mediation Theory
Multimedia
Multimedia Instruction
Notetaking
Outcome Measures
Pictures
Prior Learning
Recall
Recall (Psychology)
Transfer of Training
Undergraduate Students
University students
Variance analysis
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Although the seductive details effect, a phenomenon where interesting but irrelevant pictures impede comprehension, is well documented, studies examining ways of moderating its detrimental impact on learning remain few. The present study examined the effect of note‐taking on the seductive details effect. Chinese undergraduate participants (N = 91) were randomly assigned to three conditions that differed in terms of the presence of seductive details and learning strategy (presence or absence of note‐taking for the seductive details group). Mediation analyses results showed that seductive details undermined participants' performance on recall and transfer tasks as a result of increased cognitive load. Results from variance analyses indicated that participants in the seductive details and note‐taking condition outperformed those in the comparison group and that this effect differed depending on participants' prior knowledge and outcome measures (recall or transfer). Overall, our results suggest that note‐taking is an effective cognitive strategy that can help learners overcome the seductive details effect. Implications for theory, practice, and future research are discussed.
ISSN:0007-1013
1467-8535
DOI:10.1111/bjet.12476