Mayer’s Principles of Multimedia Learning

Dr. Rich Mayer of UC Santa Barbara is a prominent researcher of how people learn from text and graphics – or multimedia. He has developed and tested a number of principles for more effective instruction using multimedia materials. Read on to learn more, and for even more depth, use the video links to his presentation for the Harvard Initiative for Learning & Teaching at the bottom of the page. The link to the full video is included and worth watching. It includes examples of content from science and medicine.

Three Instructional Goals/Problems

1. Reduce extraneous processing – don’t make extra work for your learners by including unimportant text or graphics
2. Manage essential processing – avoid cognitive overload of the working memory
3. Foster generative processing – aid your student’s sense-making and organization

3 instructional goals/problems video

Five Principles for Reducing Extraneous Processing

People learn more deeply when…

1. Extraneous material is excluded (Coherence principle)
2. Main ideas are highlighted (Signaling principle)
3. Animation has narration without on-screen text (Redundancy principle)
4. Corresponding words and graphics are placed near rather than far from each other (Spatial contiguity principle)
5. Corresponding graphics and narration are presented simultaneously (Temporal contiguity principle)

Five principles for reducing extraneous processing video

Three Principles for Managing Essential Processing

People learn more deeply…

1. When narrated animation is presented in learner-paced segments (Segmenting principle)
2.  From a narrated animation when they have had training in the names and characteristics of key concepts (Pre-training principle)
3. From graphics and narration than from graphics and on-screen text (Modality principle)

3 Principles for managing essential processing video

Two Principles for Fostering Generative Processing  

People learn more deeply when…

1. Words are in conversational rather than formal style (Personalization principle)
2. Narration is in a human voice rather than machine voice (Voice principle)

The Bottom Line

“People learn better from multimedia messages when they are designed in ways that are consistent with how the human mind works and are consistent with research based principles.”

Videos on Topics from Mayer’s Talk

1. Examples (including med/science) of the principles in action
2. Defines learning and multimedia learning
3. Describing and defining instruction and multimedia instruction, etc.
4. Five kinds of knowledge and the role of objectives and measures
5. Three kinds of learning outcomes
6. Three demands on learners during multimedia instruction
7. Words and Pictures vs. Words alone
8. Five ways to reduce extraneous processing
9. Three ways to manage essential processing

***Taken from Rich Mayer’s talk for Harvard Initiative for Learning & Teaching
http://hilt.harvard.edu/blog/principles-multimedia-learning-richard-e-mayer