The cognitive impact of interactive design features for learningcomplex materials in medical education

摘要

To identify the most effective way for medical students to interact with a browser-based learning module on the symptoms and neurological underpinnings of stroke syndromes, this study manipulated the way in which subjects interacted with a graphical model of the brain and examined the impact of functional changes on learning outcomes. It was hypothesized that behavioral interactions that were behaviorally more engaging and which required deeper consideration of the model would result in heightened cognitive interaction and better learning than those whose manipulation required less deliberate behavioral and cognitive processing. One hundred forty four students were randomly assigned to four conditions whose model controls incorporated features that required different levels of behavioral and cognitive interaction: Movie (low behavioral/low cognitive, n = 40), Slider (high behavioral/low cognitive, n = 36), Click (low behavioral/high cognitive, n = 30), and Drag (high behavioral/high cognitive, n = 38). Analysis of Covariates (ANCOVA) showed that students who received the treatments associated with lower cognitive interactivity (Movie and Slider) performed better on a transfer task than thosereceiving the module associated with high cognitive interactivity (Click andDrag, partial eta squared = .03). In addition, the students in the highcognitive interactivity conditions spent significantly more time on the strokelocator activity than other conditions (partial eta squared = .36). The resultssuggest that interaction with controls that were tightly coupled with the modeland whose manipulation required deliberate consideration of the model’sfeatures may have overtaxed subjects’ cognitive resources. Cognitiveeffort that facilitated manipulation of content, though directed at the model,may have resulted in extraneous cognitive load, impeding subjects in recognizingthe deeper, global relationships in the materials. Instructional designers must,therefore, keep in mind that the way in which functional affordances areintegrated with the content can shape both behavioral and cognitive processing,and has significant cognitive load implications.