Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T13:05:48.042Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

6 - Implications of Cognitive Load Theory for Multimedia Learning

from Part II - Theoretical Foundations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 November 2021

By
Fred Paas  and
John Sweller
Edited by
Richard E. Mayer  and
Logan Fiorella
Richard E. Mayer
Affiliation:
University of California, Santa Barbara
Logan Fiorella
Affiliation:
University of Georgia
Get access

Summary

Human cognitive architecture indicates the manner in which cognitive structures and processes are organized. In turn, that architecture can be used to hypothesize the relative effectiveness of alternative instructional designs. Over several decades, cognitive load theory has simultaneously identified those aspects of human cognition relevant to instructional issues and tested the resultant hypotheses using randomized, controlled experiments. The cognitive architecture used by cognitive load theory has continually been developed and refined over this period. Currently, that architecture is based on evolutionary principles. This chapter outlines the cognitive architecture used by cognitive load theory and provides a general indicator of its relevance to instructional design issues associated with multimedia instruction.

Keywords

evolutionary principlescognitive load theoryhuman cognitive architecturebiologically secondary knowledgenatural selection
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning , pp. 73 - 81
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bandura, A. (1986). Social Foundations of Thought and Action: A Social Cognitive Theory. Englewoods Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Chase, W. G., & Simon, H. A. (1973). Perception in chess. Cognitive Psychology, 4, 55–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chen, O., Castro-Alonso, J. C., Paas, F., & Sweller, J. (2018). Extending cognitive load theory to incorporate working memory resource depletion: Evidence from the spacing effect. Educational Psychology Review, 30, 483–501.Google Scholar
Chen, O., Kalyuga, S., & Sweller, J. (2015). The worked example effect, the generation effect, and element interactivity. Journal of Educational Psychology, 107, 689–704.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chen, O., Kalyuga, S., & Sweller, J. (2016a). Relations between the worked example and generation effects on immediate and delayed tests. Learning and Instruction, 45, 20–30.Google Scholar
Chen, O., Kalyuga, S., & Sweller, J. (2016b). When instructional guidance is needed. Educational and Developmental Psychologist, 33, 149–162.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Groot, A. (1965). Thought and Choice in Chess. The Hague, Netherlands: Mouton (Original work published 1946).Google Scholar
Egan, D. E., & Schwartz, B. J. (1979). Chunking in recall of symbolic drawings. Memory and Cognition, 7, 149–158.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ericsson, K. A., & Kintsch, W. (1995). Long-term working memory. Psychological Review, 102, 211–245.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Geary, D. (2007). Educating the evolved mind: Conceptual foundations for an evolutionary educational psychology. In Carlson, J. S., & Levin, J. R. (eds.), Psychological Perspectives on Contemporary Educational Issues (pp. 1–99). Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.Google Scholar
Geary, D. (2008). An evolutionarily informed education science. Educational Psychologist, 43, 179–195.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Geary, D. (2012). Evolutionary educational psychology. In Harris, K., Graham, S., & Urdan, T. (eds.), APA Educational Psychology Handbook (Vol. 1, pp. 597–621). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.Google Scholar
Geary, D., & Berch, D. (2016). Evolution and children’s cognitive and academic development. In Geary, D., & Berch, D. (eds.), Evolutionary Perspectives on Child Development and Education (pp. 217–249). Switzerland: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jablonka, E., & Lamb, M. J. (2005). Evolution in Four Dimensions: Genetic, Epigenetic, Behavioral, and Symbolic Variation in the History of Life. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Jeffries, R., Turner, A., Polson, P., & Atwood, M. (1981). Processes involved in designing software. In Anderson, J. R. (ed.), Cognitive Skills and Their Acquisition (pp. 255–283). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Marcus, N., Cooper, M., & Sweller, J. (1996). Understanding instructions. Journal of Educational Psychology, 88, 49–63.Google Scholar
Miller, G. A. (1956). The magical number seven, plus or minus two: Some limits on our capacity for processing information. Psychological Review, 63, 81–97.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Newell, A., & Simon, H. A. (1972). Human Problem Solving. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Paas, F., Renkl, A., & Sweller, J. (2003). Cognitive load theory and instructional design: Recent developments. Educational Psychologist, 38, 1–4.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Paas, F., & Sweller, J. (2012). An evolutionary upgrade of cognitive load theory: Using the human motor system and collaboration to support the learning of complex cognitive tasks. Educational Psychology Review, 24, 27–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Peterson, L., & Peterson, M. (1959). Short-term retention of individual verbal items. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 58, 193–198.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Simon, H., & Gilmartin, K. (1973). A simulation of memory for chess positions. Cognitive Psychology, 5, 29–46.Google Scholar
Sweller, J. (2003). Evolution of human cognitive architecture. In Ross, B. (ed.), The Psychology of Learning and Motivation (Vol. 43, pp. 215–266). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Sweller, J. (2010). Element interactivity and intrinsic, extraneous and germane cognitive load. Educational Psychology Review, 22, 123–138.Google Scholar
Sweller, J. (2011). Cognitive load theory. In Mestre, J., & Ross, B. (eds.), The Psychology of Learning and Motivation: Cognition in Education (Vol. 55, pp. 37–76). Oxford: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Sweller, J. (2012). Human cognitive architecture: Why some instructional procedures work and others do not. In Harris, K., Graham, S., & Urdan, T. (eds.), APA Educational Psychology Handbook (Vol. 1, pp. 295–325). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.Google Scholar
Sweller, J. (2015). In academe, what is learned and how is it learned? Current Directions in Psychological Science, 24, 190–194.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sweller, J. (2016). Working memory, long-term memory and instructional design. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 5, 360–367.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sweller, J., Ayres, P., & Kalyuga, S. (2011). Cognitive Load Theory. New York: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sweller, J., & Chandler, P. (1994). Why some material is difficult to learn. Cognition and Instruction, 12, 185–233.Google Scholar
Sweller, J., & Cooper, G. A. (1985). The use of worked examples as a substitute for problem solving in learning algebra. Cognition and Instruction, 2, 59–89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sweller, J., & Sweller, S. (2006). Natural information processing systems. Evolutionary Psychology, 4, 434–458.Google Scholar
Sweller, J., van Merriënboer, J., & Paas, F. (2019). Cognitive architecture and instructional design: 20 years later. Educational Psychology Review, 31, 261–292.Google Scholar
Tindall-Ford, S., Chandler, P., & Sweller, J. (1997). When two sensory modes are better than one. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 3, 257–287.Google Scholar
Tricot, A., & Sweller, J. (2014). Domain-specific knowledge and why teaching generic skills does not work. Educational Psychology Review, 26, 265–283.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van Merriënboer, J., & Sweller, J. (2005). Cognitive load theory and complex learning: Recent developments and future directions. Educational Psychology Review, 17, 147–177.Google Scholar
West-Eberhard, M. (2003). Developmental Plasticity and Evolution. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×