Mental Model Development in Multimedia Learning: Interrelated Effects of Emotions and Self-Monitoring

Valentin Riemer,Claudia Schrader

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00899

Abstract

Learners’ emotions and metacognitive self-monitoring play a crucial role in mental model development, particularly in the context of multimedia learning. However, learning-centered emotions and self-monitoring have been investigated largely without accounting for their dynamic interrelations. In this study, the effects of both learner-state variables on mental model development were investigated, by modeling their interrelations over time during a multimedia learning episode. For this, 108 undergraduate students (Mage = 22.79, SDage = 3.42) were engaged in a multimedia learning environment to learn practical money skills. Learning-centered emotions of enjoyment, boredom, and frustration were repeatedly collected using self-reports. Learners’ self-monitoring was assessed using behavioral data in terms of time spent on accessing specific information in the multimedia environment. Mental model development was operationalized by assessing learners’ mental model accuracy (MMA) in pre- and post-tests, by using assessments of structural knowledge. Regarding the dynamic interrelations, panel models with the repeated measures revealed positive direct and indirect paths from earlier stages of self-monitoring to later stages of enjoyment. Conversely, negative direct and indirect paths emerged from earlier stages of boredom and frustration to later stages of self-monitoring. Regarding the effects of all variables on mental model development, a path model analysis with aggregated values revealed that enjoyment was unrelated to post-test MMA, whereas boredom negatively predicted post-test MMA. Additionally, frustration negatively predicted self-monitoring, which positively predicted post-test MMA. Finally, pre-test MMA was a negative predictor of boredom and positively predicted post-test MMA. The results demonstrate that the dynamic interrelations between different learning-centered emotions and self-monitoring can diverge in multimedia learning. In addition, this study provides insights into the joint effects and the relative importance of emotions and self-monitoring for mental model development in multimedia learning.

Highlights

Multimedia learning environments, defined as learning environments that provide content in verbal and non-verbal form (Mayer, 2005), enjoy lasting popularity
Multimedia learning environments are deemed to facilitate the development of accurate mental models (Moreno and Mayer, 2007; Sitzmann, 2011), affective and metacognitive learner-state variables can influence the effectiveness of multimedia learning (Moreno, 2005)
We aimed to gain a deeper understanding of how learning-centered emotions and metacognitive self-monitoring interrelate and predict mental model development in multimedia learning

Summary

Introduction

Multimedia learning environments, defined as learning environments that provide content in verbal and non-verbal form (Mayer, 2005), enjoy lasting popularity. Among the examples of such multimedia learning environments are serious games. Serious games are generally defined as computer games developed for purposes other than mere entertainment (Michael and Chen, 2006; Ritterfeld et al, 2009). They allow learners to actively engage with the learning content through animated elements that are under the learners’ control (Rieber, 2005). Additional examples of multimedia learning environments that learners can interact with are agent-based environments (e.g., Greene and Azevedo, 2009) or simulations (e.g., Darabi et al, 2009)

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