Ca' Foscari University of Venice.
Stud Health Technol Inform. 2022 Sep 2;297:533-540. doi: 10.3233/SHTI220884.
Captions have been found to benefit diverse learners, supporting comprehension, memory for content, vocabulary acquisition, and literacy. Captions may, thus, be one feature of universally designed learning (UDL) environments [1, 4]. The primary aim of this study was to examine whether captions are always useful, or whether their utility depends on individual differences, specifically proficiency in the language of the audio. To study this, we presented non-native speakers of English with an audio-visual recording of an unscripted seminar-style lesson in English retrieved from a University website. We assessed English language proficiency with an objective test. To test comprehension, we administered a ten-item comprehension test on the content of the lecture. Our secondary aim was to compare the effects of different types of captions on viewer comprehension. We, therefore, created three viewing conditions: video with no captions (NC), video with premade captions (downloaded from the university website) (UC) and video with automatically generated captions (AC). Our results showed an overall strong effect of proficiency on lecture comprehension, as expected. Interestingly, we also found that whether captions helped or not depended on proficiency and caption type. The captions provided by the University website benefited our learners only if their English language proficiency was high enough. When their proficiency was lower, however, the captions provided by the university were detrimental and performance was worse than having no captions. For the lower proficiency levels, automatic captions (AC) provided the best advantage. We attribute this finding to pre-existing characteristics of the captions provided by the university website. Taken together, these findings caution institutions with a commitment to UDL against thinking that one type of caption suits all. The study highlights the need for testing captioning systems with diverse learners, under different conditions, to better understand what factors are beneficial for whom and when.
标题已被证明有益于不同的学习者，支持理解、内容记忆、词汇习得和读写能力。因此，标题可能是通用设计学习 (UDL) 环境的一个特征[1,4]。本研究的主要目的是检验标题是否总是有用，或者它们的效用是否取决于个体差异，特别是对音频语言的熟练程度。为此，我们向非英语母语者展示了从大学网站上检索到的英语非脚本研讨会式课程的视听记录。我们使用客观测试来评估英语语言水平。为了测试理解能力，我们对讲座内容进行了十项理解测试。我们的次要目的是比较不同类型的标题对观众理解的影响。因此，我们创建了三种观看条件：没有标题的视频（NC）、带有预先制作的标题的视频（从大学网站下载）（UC）和带有自动生成的标题的视频（AC）。我们的结果显示，正如预期的那样，熟练程度对讲座理解有整体的强烈影响。有趣的是，我们还发现标题的帮助与否取决于熟练程度和标题类型。只有当学习者的英语水平足够高时，大学网站提供的标题才对他们有帮助。然而，如果他们的英语水平较低，大学提供的标题就会适得其反，表现甚至不如没有标题。对于较低的熟练水平，自动标题（AC）提供了最佳优势。我们将这一发现归因于大学网站提供的标题所具有的固有特征。总的来说，这些发现告诫那些致力于 UDL 的机构不要认为一种类型的标题适合所有人。该研究强调了需要在不同条件下对不同的学习者进行字幕系统测试，以更好地了解哪些因素对谁和何时有益。
