1. Sascha Schneider M.A. Research Associate
Emotion induction via decorative pictures Benefit or harm for learning?
Sascha Schneider M.A.
Research Associate

2. Emotions and Media

3. Emotions and Media
Media Equation
Reeves & Nass (1996)

4. CATLM (Moreno, 2005; Moreno, & Mayer, 2007)
Learning and Media
CATLM (Moreno, 2005; Moreno, & Mayer, 2007)

5. Emotions and Learning „Emotion-as-facilitator-hypothesis“
Task performance improvement (Lindström & Bohlin, 2011), response precision (Anderson & Phelps, 2001), increase in recognition performance (Levens & Phelps, 2008), enhancement of cognitive processing (Boekaerts, 2007), increased metacognitive processing (Yang, Yang, & Isen, 2013)
„Emotion-as-supressor-hypothesis“
misleading goals (Daniels et al., 2009), decreased focusing (Norman, 2004), an illusion of learning (Baumeister, Alquist, & Vohs, 2014), working memory impairment (Eysenck, Derakshan, Santos, & Calvo, 2007; Martin & Kerns, 2011), reduced cognitive processing (Lagner et al., 2014)
learning t
learning t

6. Decorative pictures and learning
Theoretical mistakes within research on seductive details:
No examination of emotional impact
No meaningful link between pictures and material
Missing information on irrelevant content

7. Study 1 - Design 82 students (mean age: 24.2 years, 71% female)
Only a variation of emotions (positive vs. negative)
Pre-tested pictures
Learning material about cell division
prior knowledge: low / no significant difference
Dependent variables:
Retention and transfer tasks (Multiple choice)
Semantic Differential questionnaire (Russell & Mehrabian, 1977)
Scales: Pleasure, Arousal, Dominance

8. Study 1 - Hypotheses
Positive vs Negative
Dominance
Dominance

9. Study 1 - Materials

10. Study 1 - Results p = .043, ηp2 = .05 p = .02, ηp2 = .07
Retention scores ranges from 0 to 21
Transfer scores ranges from 0 to 12
p = .02, ηp2 = .07
p = .043, ηp2 = .05

11. Study 1 - Results p < .001 ηp2 = .30 p = .001 ηp2 = .13 n.s.
No differences in motivation or cognitive load
p < .001
ηp2 = .30
p = .001
ηp2 = .13
n.s.

12. Discussion Learning enhancement through positive pictures
Higher pleasure and arousal scores for positive pictures
Higher arousal scores might have led to long-term memory enhancement (Bradley, Greenwald, Petry, & Lang, 1992)
A closer look at different activation levels could be helpful

13. Study 2 - Design 121 students (mean age: 23.2 years, 77% female)
Only a variation of emotions (PAE, NAE, NDE)
Pre-tested pictures (N = 96)
Learning material about Volleyball
prior knowledge: low / no significant difference
Dependent variables:
Retention and transfer tasks
(Multiple choice)
Task-irrelevant thinking (Sarason, 1984)
Intrinsic motivation (Guay, Vallerand, & Blanchard, 2000)
referring to Pekrun et al. (2002)

14. Study 2 - Hypotheses
Positive Active vs. Negative Active vs. Negative Deactive

15. Study 2 Volleyball – An Introduction
Introduction The Serve Game Structure

16. Study 2 - Results p < .001, ηp2 = .02 p = .04, ηp2 = .01
n.s.

17. Study 2 - Results p = .03, ηp2 = .01 n.s. p < .001, ηp2 = .03

18. Discussion PAE pictures are best suited to increase retention
Transfer scores are decreased by a low activation
Retention perfomances might be affected by task- irrelevant thinking
Transfer might additionally be affected by an increase in motivation for active pictures