Distance Matters: Spatial Contiguity Effects as Trade‐Off between Gaze Switches and Memory Load

Abstract

The present study combined the approaches of multimedia learning and of comparative visual search (Hardiess, Gillner, & Mallot, 2008) in order to analyse the processing of spatially separated information. Participants were asked to compare two depictions of a mechanical pendulum clock to detect no, one, or two differences between them. The spatial distance between the two depictions was varied, and participants received either stimulus-related information about the functionalities of pendulum clocks or stimulus-unrelated information about the design of cuckoo clocks. The study demonstrates a trade-off between gaze movement and working memory use. We observed fewer gaze shifts with increasing distance between the pictures, suggesting higher working memory use. The findings indicate that the distance between two pictures, domain knowledge and visual working memory span are important factors that determine memory load required for processing split information sources.

Self‐regulated learning from illustrated text: Eye movement modelling to support use and regulation of cognitive processes during learning from multimedia

“…In the present learning task, it may not have mattered whether a longer picture processing was due to few, but longer picture inspection times (associated with few text-picture transitions) or many, but shorter picture inspection times (associated with many text-picture transitions). Since the texts were relatively short and the pictures highly schematized, integration might be achieved by holding active in memory information from one representation while processing the other representation, thus requiring fewer switches between representations (Bauhoff, Huff, & Schwan, 2012). On the other hand, children who served as participants in the studies by Mason et al (2013Mason et al ( , 2015Mason et al ( , 2017, in which transitions proved predictive for learning, may not yet have available the working-memory capacity to resort to memory-based integration strategies.…”

“…The amount and complexity of text and pictures relative to the learners' prior knowledge may have an influence on whether integration can be achieved from memory alone (cf. Bauhoff et al, 2012). Moreover, previous studies have relied on the assumption that there will be a positive linear relationship between the number of integrative saccades and learning outcomes.…”

Optimizing Stepwise Animation in Dynamic Set Diagrams

“… C.1 Better visibility : The visibility of each action should be enhanced during the stepwise animation, in particular by suppressing undesirable occlusions and unrelated visual effects. C.2 Limited degree of complexity : Each stepwise transition is forced to contain only a few actions to effectively assist viewers to visually interpret the target action by following the visualization design proposed by Bach et al [BPF14]. C.3 Minimal gaze shift : Total gaze shift throughout the animation should be minimized to reduce the cognitive load imposed on viewers [BHS12]. …”

“…C.2 Limited degree of complexity: Each stepwise transition is forced to contain only a few actions to effectively assist viewers to visually interpret the target action by following the visualization design proposed by Bach et al [BPF14]. C.3 Minimal gaze shift: Total gaze shift throughout the animation should be minimized to reduce the cognitive load imposed on viewers [BHS12].…”

“…Note that our optimization criteria for reducing the cognitive load originate from the study performed by Bauhoff et al [BHS12], where the researchers claimed that working memory use increases when the gaze shift becomes longer. Since our approach expects users to focus their visual attention on the series of atomic changes that constitute the difference between the two set diagrams, we want to minimize the total distance of such gaze motion during the stepwise animation to fully reduce the associated cognitive load.…”