The perplexing role of learner control in e-learning: will learning and transfer benefit or suffer?

Exploring factors influencing young children's learning from storybooks: Interactive and multimedia features

Electronic storybooks are increasingly popular with preschoolers. The purpose of our research was to investigate the effects of interactive and multimedia features in electronic storybooks on preschoolers' learning. We assigned 4- to 6-year-old children to different reading conditions in two experiments. Children were required to complete tests for learning outcomes and answer questions about the reading experience. In Experiment 1, children in the interactive (self-paced) group needed to turn the pages by a button on the page, whereas the pages were turned automatically in the non-interactive (system-controlled) group. We found that children in the system-controlled condition performed better in inference making than children in the self-paced condition. In Experiment 2, we used a 2 (Animation: present or non-present) × 2 (Background Music: present or non-present) between-participants design. We found that children's scores of learning and interest in groups with animations were higher than those in groups without animations. This research suggests that electronic books with animations congruent with the learning content promote learning for both adults and young children. Thus, we offer suggestions for designers of electronic books. Moreover, the study provides implications for educators and parents, and we suggest that multi-featured electronic storybooks for preschoolers should be carefully selected.

Effects of learner control design in an AR-based exhibit on visitors' museum learning

This study shifts the focus away from demonstrating the existence of the effect toward understanding the mechanism by which the effect of AR operates in museum learning. By uncovering and describing the contingencies of AR from the perspectives of learner control, this study investigates how and when AR affects museum learning experiences, and to give insights into curation with AR. A between-subjects experiment was conducted with 48 college students divided into three groups. This study considered both qualitative and quantitative features of learner control and designed the AR control tools and experiment accordingly, and the findings supported the success of integrating the immersive technology of AR and the theoretical framework of learner control to construct museum exhibits. The results showed that visitors are willing to use the provided tools in museum AR and perform steadily in knowledge acquisition. In addition to offering more learner control in museums, AR promotes positive behaviors and attitudes. This study contributes to the field studies of learner control by linking learner control with the critical dimensions of AR-enhanced museum learning to provide more guidance in exhibit design. Based on the findings, practical suggestions on incorporating learner control in AR-based interactive exhibits are provided.

Learner Control and e-Learning: Taking Stock and Moving Forward

Research has historically adopted one of two views toward learner discretion in training: Learner discretion is controlled by training characteristics (i.e., the instruction-centric view), or learner discretion is a substantive learning process, the understanding of which is essential to developing more effective training (i.e., the learner-centric view). More recently, training scholars have followed the general trend in scientific psychology toward increasingly nuanced and interactionist views of individual behavior. That is, the effectiveness of providing learner discretion is a joint and interactive function of both instruction-centric and learner-centric processes. Taken together, learner-centric, instruction-centric, and interactionist-centric processes propose a constellation of constructs necessary to understand learner control. Here we review the diverse literatures examining learner-control-related constructs and derive specific practical recommendations for designing e-learning. These recommendations follow from the interactionist perspective of learning in modern work environments.