Vogt Andrea, Albus Patrick, Seufert Tina
Department Learning and Instruction, Institute of Psychology and Education, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany.
Front Psychol. 2021 Mar 24;12:645032. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.645032. eCollection 2021.
One challenge while learning scientific concepts is to select relevant information and to integrate different representations of the learning content into one coherent mental model. Virtual reality learning environments (VRLEs) offer new possibilities to support learners and foster learning processes. Whether learning in VR is successful, however, depends to a large extent on the design of the VRLE and the learners themselves. Hence, adding supportive elements in VRLEs, such as annotations, might facilitate the learning process by guiding attention and supporting the selection of relevant information. Additionally, the mapping of pictorial and verbal information is eased by these annotations. The beneficial effect of annotations is highly dependent on learners' intrinsic motivation as intrinsic motivation while learning also affects the information selection and visual search patterns. In our experimental study ( = 61), we compared two conditions: learning in a VRLE with or without annotations. We measured the learning outcome on three different levels (knowledge, comprehension, and application). Additionally, we investigated intrinsic motivation as a moderator for the effect of annotations on learning outcome. We found no significant main effect of annotations on learning outcome. The moderating effect of intrinsic motivation for annotations on the overall learning outcome was significant. Our results imply that learners are either intrinsically motivated or need additional support by annotations as these support the selection of relevant information in the VRLE and therefore enable them to learn successfully. Which type or quantity of annotations supports learning processes best needs to be explored in future research.
学习科学概念时面临的一个挑战是选择相关信息，并将学习内容的不同表现形式整合为一个连贯的心理模型。虚拟现实学习环境（VRLE）为支持学习者和促进学习过程提供了新的可能性。然而，在VR中学习是否成功在很大程度上取决于VRLE的设计和学习者自身。因此，在VRLE中添加支持性元素，如注释，可能通过引导注意力和支持相关信息的选择来促进学习过程。此外，这些注释还简化了图像和语言信息的映射。注释的有益效果高度依赖于学习者的内在动机，因为学习时的内在动机也会影响信息选择和视觉搜索模式。在我们的实验研究（n = 61）中，我们比较了两种情况：在有或没有注释的VRLE中学习。我们在三个不同层面（知识、理解和应用）测量了学习成果。此外，我们将内在动机作为注释对学习成果影响的调节因素进行了研究。我们发现注释对学习成果没有显著的主效应。内在动机对注释对整体学习成果的调节效应是显著的。我们的结果表明，学习者要么具有内在动机，要么需要注释的额外支持，因为这些支持在VRLE中选择相关信息，从而使他们能够成功学习。哪种类型或数量的注释最能支持学习过程需要在未来的研究中进行探索。
