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In a 2 × 2 design, we examined the role of visual cognitive style in two multimedia-based learning environments (text plus static pictures/animations). A statistically significant interaction was obtained for deeper comprehension: Highly developed visualizers (HDV) who learned with static pictures performed better than HDV who learned with animations, and less developed visualizers (LDV) performed the same with static pictures or animations.For factual knowledge, there was a main effect in favor of HDV. Subsequent tests revealed that HDV outperformed LDV only when learning from static pictures, but not when studying animations. There were no overall differences between animations and static ...

Background: Considerable attention has been afforded to analyzing the content of and assessing consumers' reaction to print direct-to-consumer drug ads, but not so for televised ads. Objective: To determine whether advertisements with different risk severity and risk presentation would significantly affect viewers' (1) recall of information contained in the advertisement, (2) evaluation of the advertisement, and (3) perceptions of the advertised product's risks. Methods: Data were collected from a sample of 135 first-year pharmacy students at a Midwestern college of pharmacy. After viewing 1 of the 6 advertisements designed for this study, participants were asked to complete a self-administered survey. ...

New Zealand recently completed a rewrite of its Income Tax Act (ITA), a project initiated on the basis of reducing complexity through drafting more readable legislation. It is now appropriate to assess the extent to which this goal has been achieved. The rewrite project was undertaken in an iterative manner, incorporating four major steps (and creating three new complete versions of the ITA), enabling researchers to assess the achievements of each stage by utilizing readability measures as proxies for understandability. This paper builds upon earlier research that primarily uses Flesch and associated formulae through adopting the Cloze ...

We tested the effectiveness of overaccommodative speech as a way to improve comprehension and recall of diagnostic and medication regimen instructions. Forty younger (M age = 21 years) and 82 older (M age = 71 years) adult women watched a videotape of an actor presenting medication instructions in either an overaccommodative or a neutral speaking style. Only older women with higher working memory performance levels benefited from overaccommodative speech. All groups had similar subjective reactions to the two types of stimuli: They preferred the speech attributes in the overaccommodative speech but preferred the person attributes of the neutral speaker. Finally, ...

We present evidence that the comprehension of illustrated tee makes use of the visuospatial sketchpad component ofworking memory. The results from three experiments demonstrate that the comprehending of teats that are accompanied by pictures interferes with the performance of a spatial short-term memory task more than does the comprehending of texts that have no pictures. A fourth experiment demonstrates that the interference is found only when there is a requirement to comprehend the text; that is, the simple presentation of the texts and their pictures did not degrade performance on the spatial task. Finally, we show that the comprehension of ...

This study investigated a pragmatic way to enhance student learning of complex science concepts in 62 undergraduate nonscience majors with known naive conceptions (NCs) about projectile motion. Ss were assigned to 1 of 6 groups formed from 3 levels of a prior knowledge activation activity and 2 levels of text. A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) showed that activating Ss' NCs about a complex science concept is not as effective a means for dispelling inaccurate information as is the practice of activating their NCs and then directing them to ideas that might differ from their own. This result and the ...

In two experiments, graduate students read a chapter-length text accompanied by seven outlines or graphic organizers. Students then performed 10 trials where they either viewed an image or listened to a sound, were tested on comprehension of the text and then were tested on recognition of the image or sound. In both experiments students who studied graphic organizers performed worse on the visual task, and in the second experiment, students who studied outlines performed worse on the auditory task. These results provide evidence that graphic organizers are encoded in a more visual format than outlines, whereas outlines are encoded in ...

In two experiments, graduate students read a chapter-length text accompanied by seven outlines or graphic organizers. Students then performed 10 trials where they either viewed an image or listened to a sound, were tested on comprehension of the text and then were tested on recognition of the image or sound. In both experiments students who studied graphic organizers performed worse on the visual task, and in the second experiment, students who studied outlines performed worse on the auditory task. These results provide evidence that graphic organizers are encoded in a more visual format than outlines, whereas outlines are encoded in ...

Objective: The present study aimed to contribute to the design of effective health education information. Based on cognitive-psychological theory, pictures were expected to improve understanding of two existing textual instructions for using asthma devices (inhaler chamber and peak flow meter). From an analysis of the affordances and constraints of both devices this effect was expected to be stronger with the inhaler chamber than with the peak flow meter. Methods: To test this, both instructions were systematically illustrated with seven line-drawings visualizing the actions. In two separate randomized controlled trials with in total 99 participants from the general public, the original ...

Visual illustrations accompanying television news broadcasts are often hypothesized to increase viewers' recall of news items. A review of reported studies, however, yields mixed results for this notion. The present article argues that effects of emotional visuals are reflected not in the exact recall of the text but through specific kinds of errors in recall and the relation of these errors to certain parts of the item. These errors occur because emotional visuals focus attention on specific parts of a news item, and that recall of the item is reconstructed from perceptual judgments that are generalized from these specific parts. ...