S u m m a r y

Hannus M (1998)

Textbook illustrations - decoration or an aid to understanding

Psykologia 33(2):98-101. Helsinki ISSN 0355-1067.

 

The aim of the study was to find out how the illustrations on a double page of a textbook page affect the learning of ten-year-old stydents. The effect of illustrations on learning was studied by performing a learning test at a certain grade level.

According to the results, illustrations improved the learning of a text. The effects of illustrations on learning emerged when retrieving small trivia from memory and performing illustrated exercises. No general improvement in the understanding of text content was detected.

The main result was that the students used 94 % of the processing time for processing the verbal contents and only 6 % of the time looking at the illustrations. In addition, the students did not utilize the illustrations while they were reading the text, since ten-year-old students were already using a text-oriented model to process the pages in the textbook.

The learning differences between the good and the poor students appeared already in the first eye movements when picking up information. The poor students resorted to memory whereas the good students proceeded further towards understanding. There was no difference in the processing time between the good and the poor students.

The results warrant the re-evaluation of both the text and illustrations in current textbooks and the whole textbook concept. In particular the results disprove many current ideas about the decisive functions of illustrations in learning from a textbook.

 

Matti Hannus, Ph.D. (psych.), Ilpoisten koulu, Lauklähteenkatu 11, FIN-20740 Turku, Finland.