Self-Generated or Cue-Induced—Different Kinds of Expectations to Be Considered

Peer Reviewe

Eye Tracking Indicators of Reading Approaches in Text-Picture Comprehension

Despite numerous researches on reading as well as multimedia comprehension, reading approaches in text-picture comprehension have become a focus of research only rarely. The current experiment aims at exploring text-picture comprehension in different reading approaches with item solving. In a within subjects design using eye tracking, seventeen secondary school students processed our blended text and picture materials in three different ways. (1) Unguided processing with text and picture and without the question. (2) Information gathering to answer the question after the prior experience with text and pictures. (3) Comprehending text and pictures to solve the task with the prior information of the question. Eye tracking data showed that text and picture play different roles in comprehension in different reading approaches. The data suggest that (1) text plays the main role to construct the mental model in unguided spontaneous processing of text and picture. (2) Students seem to mainly rely on the picture as an external representation when trying to answer a question after the prior experience with the material. (3)Text and picture are both used heavily when students work out an answer with the prior experience with the question presented. The text likely plays a major part in guiding the processing of meaning, whereas the picture is used as an external representation for information retrieval. Our work provides a first step towards an Item Solving Model in Text-Picture Comprehension. It also provides pedagogical implications for learning in secondary school

Regulating distance to the screen while engaging in difficult tasks

Regulation of distance to the screen (i.e., head-to-screen distance, fluctuation of head-to-screen distance) has been proved to reflect the cognitive engagement of the reader. However, it is still not clear (a) whether regulation of distance to the screen can be a potential parameter to infer high cognitive load and (b) whether it can predict the upcoming answer accuracy. Configuring tablets or other learning devices in a way that distance to the screen can be analyzed by the learning software is in close reach. The software might use the measure as a person-specific indicator of need for extra scaffolding. In order to better gauge this potential, we analyzed eye-tracking data of children (N = 144, Mage = 13 years, SD = 3.2 years) engaging in multimedia learning, as distance to the screen is estimated as a by-product of eye tracking. Children were told to maintain a still seated posture while reading and answering questions at three difficulty levels (i.e., easy vs. medium vs. difficult). Results yielded that task difficulty influences how well the distance to the screen can be regulated, supporting that regulation of distance to the screen is a promising measure. Closer head-to-screen distance and larger fluctuation of head-to-screen distance can reflect that participants are engaging in a challenging task. Only large fluctuation of head-to-screen distance can predict the future incorrect answers. The link between distance to the screen and processing of cognitive task can obtrusively embody reader’s cognitive states during system usage, which can support adaptive learning and testing

Parallel and serial task processing in the PRP paradigm: a drift–diffusion model approach

Even after a long time of research on dual-tasking, the question whether the two tasks are always processed serially (response selection bottleneck models, RSB) or also in parallel (capacity-sharing models) is still going on. The first models postulate that the central processing stages of two tasks cannot overlap, producing a central processing bottleneck in Task 2. The second class of models posits that cognitive resources are shared between the central processing stages of two tasks, allowing for parallel processing. In a series of three experiments, we aimed at inducing parallel vs. serial processing by manipulating the relative frequency of short vs. long SOAs (Experiments 1 and 2) and including no-go trials in Task 2 (Experiment 3). Beyond the conventional response time (RT) analyses, we employed drift–diffusion model analyses to differentiate between parallel and serial processing. Even though our findings were rather consistent across the three experiments, they neither support unambiguously the assumptions derived from the RSB model nor those derived from capacity-sharing models. SOA frequency might lead to an adaptation to frequent time patterns. Overall, our diffusion model results and mean RTs seem to be better explained by participant’s time expectancies

How we use what we learn in Math: An integrative account of the development of commutativity.

One of the crucial issues in mathematics development is how children acquire mathematical concepts and procedures. Most researchers now agree that this knowledge develops iteratively (e.g., Resnick, 1992). However, little is known about how well this knowledge is integrated into a more abstract concept and how children come to spontaneously apply such concepts. Expertise research suggests that spontaneously spot and use a principle whenever it applies requires well-integrated conceptual and procedural knowledge. Here, we report a method allowing to asses procedural and conceptual knowledge about the commutative principle in an unobtrusive manner. In two different tasks, procedural and conceptual knowledge of second and third graders as well as adult students were assessed independently and without any hint concerning commutativity. Results show that, even though second graders according to our measures already possessed procedural and conceptual knowledge about commutativity, the knowledge assessed in these two tasks was unrelated. An integrated relation between the two measures first emerged with some of the third graders and was further strengthened for adult students

Individual Differences in Goal Pursuit Despite Interfering Aversion, Temptation, and Distraction

Self-control can be defined as the ability to exert control over ones impulses. Currently, most research in the area relies on self-report. Focusing on attentional control processes involved in self-control, we modified a spatial selective attentional cueing task to test three domains of self- control experimentally in one task using aversive, tempting, and neutral picture-distractors. The aims of the study were (1) to investigate individual differences in the susceptibility to aversive, tempting, and neutral distraction within one paradigm and (2) to test the association of these three self-control domains to conventional measures of self-control including self- report. The final sample consisted of 116 participants. The task required participants to identify target letters “E” or “F” presented at a cued target location while the distractors were presented. Behavioral and eyetracking data were obtained during the performance of the task. High task performance was encouraged via monetary incentives. In addition to the attentional self- control task, self-reported self-control was assessed and participants performed a color Stroop task, an unsolvable anagram task and a delay of gratification task using chocolate sweets. We found that aversion, temptation, and neutral distraction were associated with significantly increased error rates, reaction times and gaze pattern deviations. Overall task performance on our task correlated with self-reported self-control ability. Measures of aversion, temptation, and distraction showed moderate split-half reliability, but did not correlate with each other across participants. Additionally, participants who made a self-controlled decision in the delay of gratification task were less distracted by temptations in our task than participants who made an impulsive choice. Our individual differences analyses suggest that (1) the ability to endure aversion, resist temptations and ignore neutral distractions are independent of each other and (2) these three domains are related to other measures of self-control

Information Reduction as item-general strategy change

Übung beeinflusst nicht nur wie sondern auch welche Information verarbeitet wird. Die bisherige Forschung zur Informationsreduktion (Haider & Frensch, 1996) hat die Wichtigkeit des letzteren Aspektes für den kognitiven Fertigkeitserwerb herausgearbeitet. Informationsreduktion tritt in Situationen auf, in denen Aufgaben sowohl relevante als auch irrelevante Information enthalten. Informationsreduktion stellt einen Strategiewechsel dar, bei dem ein Übergang von einer Strategie, die das Prozessieren aller Elemente einer Aufgabe beinhaltet, hin zu einer Strategie, bei der nur die relevanten Elemente prozessiert werden, stattfindet. Einerseits wurde in vielen Kontexten (z.B. Psychologie der Mensch-Maschine Interaktion, Pädagogische-, und Sport-Psychologie) beobachtet, dass Menschen dazu neigen, irrelevante Information nach mehrfacher Darbietung zu ignorieren. Andererseits ist sowohl hinsichtlich der theoretischen Auseinandersetzung mit Strategiewechsel im kognitiven Fertigkeitserwerb, als auch aus praktischer Sicht nicht genügend geklärt, wie Informationsreduktion stattfindet und welche Faktoren fördernd bzw. hemmend wirken. In der hier zusammengefassten Forschung, hatten Probandinnen und Probanden die Aufgabe zu prüfen, ob alphanumerische Zeichenketten dem Alphabet folgen oder nicht. Die Zeichenketten bestanden aus zwei Teilen. Einer der beiden Teile war immer korrekt und daher letztlich irrelevant. Da verschiedene Zeichenketten unterschiedlich oft pro Übungsblock präsentiert wurden, konnte ermittelt werden, ob Informationsreduktion Item-spezifisch oder Item-generell stattfindet. Die Frage ist also, ob die Versuchspersonen den irrelevanten Teil für jede Zeichenkette einzeln zu ignorieren lernen, oder aber die Fertigkeit zum Ignorieren des irrelevanten Teiles auf einmal für alle Zeichenketten erwerben. Letzteres traf zu, Informationsreduktion fand Item-generell statt. Die Befunde sind inkonsistent mit der Annahme dass Strategiewechsel im Allgemeinen und Informationsreduktion im Besonderen, ausschließlich durch Item-spezifische, datengetriebene Lernprozesse erklärbar sind und willkürliche Entscheidungen beim Strategiewechsel folglich keine Rolle spielen. Statt dessen deuten die Daten (Reaktionszeiten, Fixationen, Transfer-Fehler) darauf hin, dass Strategiewechsel top-down moduliert sind.Practice not only affects how but also which information is processed. Past research on Information Reduction (Haider & Frensch, 1996) has underscored the importance of the latter aspect for cognitive skill acquisition. Information Reduction applies in situations in which tasks contain both relevant and irrelevant information, and denotes a change from a strategy involving processing all elements of a task to a processing-relevant-elements-only strategy. On the one hand, it has been repeatedly observed in a broad range of contexts (e.g., human-machine interaction, educational and sports psychology) that people tend to ignore irrelevant information after repeated exposure. On the other hand, both from the perspective of theories on skill acquisition and for practical concerns, it is not sufficiently understood how Information Reduction takes place and which factors foster or impede it. In the research presented here, participants had the task to verify whether or not alphanumeric strings followed the alphabetical order. These strings were a compound of two parts, one of which was always correct and thus effectively irrelevant. As the different strings were repeated at different rates per practice block, it could be tested whether people learn to ignore irrelevant aspects of a task string by string or rather once and for all strings. Information Reduction was item-general rather than item-specific. The data are inconsistent with the view that strategy change in general, and Information Reduction in particular, is exclusively based on item-specific data-driven learning processes, bare of the involvement of a voluntary decision. Rather, RTs, fixations, and transfer errors indicated that strategy change entails top-down modulation