Learner's Working Memory Research Articles

Does the effect of enthusiasm in a pedagogical Agent's voice depend on mental load in the Learner's working memory?

The emotional design hypothesis states that features in digital learning materials can elicit emotional reactions. Voice-related cues, such as enthusiastic accentuations are getting more into the focus of research. These emotion-related cues have to be additionally processed to the relevant instructions while learning, so that the overall amount of to-be-processed information might be a moderator of the effect of emotional cues. One hundred eighteen participants were assigned to one cell of a two (enthusiasm of a pedagogical agent: enthusiastic vs. neutral) × two (mental load in the working memory of the learner: high vs. low) factorial between-subjects design. Regarding the multiple-choice learning test, results revealed that learners with a neutral agent voice performed better in a high load condition, while learners exposed to an enthusiastic voice reached higher learning scores in a low load condition. However, this moderating effect of mental load could not be shown for open answer questions.

Using an Intelligent Tutoring System to Support Learners’ WMC in e-learning: Application in Mathematics Learning

Learning is a complex process linked to a number of individual, cognitive and affective characteristics of the learner. In this context, the learner’s Working Memory (WM) concept has also been identified as a preacher of learning performance. In the learning process, solving a problem is an essential part of the learner's WM. Its capacity and performance are predictive factors of academic success. The success of the given problem depends on a good selection, processing and transformation of this information. This mental work within the WM requires a good WM Capacity (WMC). The improvement of the WMC needs some strategies which focus on the learning content and the use of educational technologies in the learning process.
 Encouraged by the results of previous research, this work aims to harness the potential of educational technologies to enhance the learners' WM ability in learning mathematics in an e-learning environment. In order to help learners with low WMC in e-learning, this paper proposes to set up an e-learning platform integrating an Intelligent Tutorial System (ITS). The purpose of this ITS is to manage the limited ability of the learner's WM by adopting strategies that improve the transition of mathematical knowledge from short-term memory to long-term memory. The proposed ITS generates e-learning content that will serve to improve the learner's WMC, and subsequently improve his learning performance.

Frequency and working memory effects in incidental learning of a complex agreement pattern

Complex grammatical structures have been assumed to be best learned implicitly (Krashen, 1982, 1994; Reber, 1989). However, research to date has failed to support this view, instead finding that explicit training has overarching beneficial effects. The present study attempted to elucidate this issue by examining how type and token frequencies in incidental learning input and individual differences in the learner's working memory (WM) combine to affect the receptive and productive learning of a complex agreement pattern in a novel language. The findings indicated that type frequency significantly enhanced receptive knowledge acquisition even more than explicit instruction. Performance on the productive knowledge retrieval task was poor under all learning conditions but most accurate under the explicit learning condition. WM was not implicated in incidental learning, possibly indicating that all learners experience high cognitive demand imposed by the target structure regardless of variation in WM capacity.

The Influence of Background Music on Learning in the Light of Different Theoretical Perspectives and the Role of Working Memory Capacity.

This study investigates how background music influences learning with respect to three different theoretical approaches. Both the Mozart effect as well as the arousal-mood-hypothesis indicate that background music can potentially benefit learning outcomes. While the Mozart effect assumes a direct influence of background music on cognitive abilities, the arousal-mood-hypothesis assumes a mediation effect over arousal and mood. However, the seductive detail effect indicates that seductive details such as background music worsen learning. Moreover, as working memory capacity has a crucial influence on learning with seductive details, we also included the learner’s working memory capacity as a factor in our study. We tested 81 college students using a between-subject design with half of the sample listening to two pop songs while learning a visual text and the other half learning in silence. We included working memory capacity in the design as a continuous organism variable. Arousal and mood scores before and after learning were collected as potential mediating variables. To measure learning outcomes we tested recall and comprehension. We did not find a mediation effect between background music and arousal or mood on learning outcomes. In addition, for recall performance there were no main effects of background music or working memory capacity, nor an interaction effect of these factors. However, when considering comprehension we did find an interaction between background music and working memory capacity: the higher the learners’ working memory capacity, the better they learned with background music. This is in line with the seductive detail assumption.

‘When Dual Sensory Mode with Limited Text Presentation Enhance Learning’

Advances in the knowledge of human memory suggest that under some circumstances, more processing capacity is effectively available to learners if instructional materials use multiple modalities (e.g. auditory for text and visual for pictures). According to cognitive load theory, some conventional approaches to instructional design are ineffective as they place an unnecessary load on a learner's working memory and cause learning to be hindered. Previous research, particularly in technically-based areas, has demonstrated that duplicating the same text in both visual and auditory formats may inhibit learning (audiovisual redundancy effect). However, it is not yet clear whether partial on-screen textual information (e.g., key words or phrases) presented simultaneously with fully narrated text would generate a similar negative effect or be beneficial for learning, especially when the language of instruction is a foreign or second language for the learners. Accordingly, the reported study examined whether supporting the narrated textual explanations of the related graphics in a visual form as key words or phrases would be more effective to learning in a realistic setting (and with English as a foreign language for the students) than the exact visual duplication of the narrated text. University students learned steps of psychosexual development since childhood up to adolescence period through audio text and graphics presented using PowerPoint slides and three different versions of the visual text: 1) the full text equivalent to the narrated explanations; 2) the reduced version of the text that presented phrases expressing major ideas in the text; and 3) key words representing main concepts. The pre and post- tests were conducted to evaluate levels of learner prior knowledge and post-instruction performance. The results indicated that the auditory explanations of the graphics supported by visual display of main phrases related to the explanations resulted in significantly better learning that either exact full visual duplication of the text or presenting only a limited number of key words. The study shows that supporting the audio explanations of graphics with visually presented on-screen phrases expressing main ideas of the text could be the most effective way of instructing learners for whom the language of instruction is a foreign or second language.

Environmental support hypothesis in designing multimedia training for older adults: Is less always more?

This study explores younger and older adults learning of MS Publisher functionalities from a multimedia tutorial. Twenty younger and twenty three older adults assigned to a redundant (experimental) or non-redundant (control) condition were taught how to create a greeting card, while the results of their learning were assessed with immediate and delayed performance measures. While younger learners benefited from a non-redundant condition, older learners exhibited an opposite trend. Redundant condition was beneficial for their performance efficiency on a set of a transfer tasks, and their troubleshooting performance during the delayed session. From a cognitive load perspective, using a redundant text along with an audio narration overloads learner's working memory by placing more strain on the visual pathway and not providing any additional cognitive advantage. From an environmental support standpoint and decreased processing resources view of cognitive aging, providing additional representational support helps reducing the task demands for older adults and results in better learning. The results have cognitive and practical implications for the design of multimedia learning environments for older adults.

Evaluation of Cognitive Loads Imposed by Traditional Paper-Based and Innovative Computer-Based Instructional Strategies

Strategies of presenting instructional information affect the type of cognitive load imposed on the learner's working memory. Effective instruction reduces extraneous (ineffective) cognitive load and promotes germane (effective) cognitive load. Eighty first-year students from two veterinary schools completed a two-section questionnaire that evaluated their perspectives on the educational value of a computer-based instructional program. They compared the difference between cognitive loads imposed by paper-based and computer-based instructional strategies used to teach the anatomy of the canine skeleton. Section I included 17 closed-ended items, rated on a five-point Likert scale, that assessed the use of graphics, content, and the learning process. Section II included a nine-point mental effort rating scale to measure the level of difficulty of instruction; students were asked to indicate the amount of mental effort invested in the learning task using both paper-based and computer-based presentation formats. The closed-ended data were expressed as means and standard deviations. A paired t test with an alpha level of 0.05 was used to determine the overall mean difference between the two presentation formats. Students positively evaluated their experience with the computer-based instructional program with a mean score of 4.69 (SD=0.53) for use of graphics, 4.70 (SD=0.56) for instructional content, and 4.45 (SD=0.67) for the learning process. The mean difference of mental effort (1.50) between the two presentation formats was significant, t=8.26, p≤.0001, df=76, for two-tailed distribution. Consistent with cognitive load theory, innovative computer-based instructional strategies decrease extraneous cognitive load compared with traditional paper-based instructional strategies.

Working Memory, Motivation, and Teacher-Initiated Learning

Working memory is where we “think” as we learn. A notion that emerges as a synthesis from several threads in the research literatures of cognition, motivation, and connectionism is that motivation in learning is the process whereby working memory resource allocation is instigated and sustained. This paper reviews much literature on motivation and working memory, and concludes that the apparent novelty of the proposal offered to describe motivation in terms of working memory results from the apparent lack of cross-channel exchange among these research traditions. The relation between working memory and motivation is explored in the context of the interactive compensatory model of learning (ICML) in which learning is considered to result from the interaction of ability, motivation, and prior learning. The ICML is recast in light of the revised definition of motivation offered here. This paper goes on to suggest ways in which a range of teaching and learning issues and activities may be reconceptualized in the context of a model emphasizing a learner's working memory that makes use of chunks of previously acquired knowledge.

Integration and its effect on acquiring knowledge about competing scientific theories for text.

Successful learning from scientific text depends upon a learner's ability to integrate successively encountered ideas in the text. High school and university students read texts that presented competing theories for ongoing scientific problems (e.g., the gradualist vs. catastrophic theories of dinosaur extinction) under two conditions: an integrated-text format versus a separate-text format. The integrated-text format was designed to portray science as inquiry and offered each theory as a possible solution to the scientific problem. The separate text presented the two theories successively in separate texts and made no mention of their conflicting nature. In general, the integrated-text format tended to facilitate performance on tests that measured integration of ideas rather than memory for discrete facts. The study showed that successful learning is also affected by learner characteristics, such as the maturity of the learner's epistemic views about knowledge and the capacity of the learner's working memory. The results suggest that integration processes contribute significantly to students' abilities to gain a deep understanding of science from written texts.