Open Captioning as a Means of Communicating Health Information: The Role of Cognitive Load in Processing Entertainment-Education Content

Abstract

Despite considerable research on entertainment-education, the influence of cognition on viewer appreciation and learning remains unclear. A pretest-posttest laboratory experiment was conducted to examine the effects of explicit health information embedded in a medical drama via video captioning on the processing of the narrative and health information and acquisition of health knowledge. The captions increased cognitive load for health information processing, facilitating recall, and retention of health knowledge. Neither cognitive load for narrative processing nor narrative absorption differed between the captioned and uncaptioned videos. The findings suggest discrete but complementary areas of cognition for entertainment content designed for health education.