Imagery Prompts Improve Learning From Scientific Text

• In Event: Science and Technology

Abstract

Two experiments investigated the effects of mental imagery prompts on learning from scientific text. Students read a computer-based text on the human respiratory system (control group), read while being asked to form an image corresponding to each of nine paragraphs (imagery group), or read while being asked to form an image and also seeing an onscreen drawing before each paragraph (picture-before-imagery group) or after each paragraph (picture-after-imagery group). Imagery prompts facilitated transfer and retention performance compared to a control group on an immediate test (Experiment 1) and on a delayed test (Experiment 2), but the added drawings had no additional effect. The imagination principle is that people learn more deeply when prompted to form images of what they are reading.

Authors

• Claudia Leopold, University of Münster

• Richard E. Mayer, University of California - Santa Barbara