Pictures, Audio, and Print: Symbolic Representation and Effect on Learning

Gwen C. Nugent

Gwen C. Nugent is assistant project director for the Interactive Cable Project at Nebraska ETV, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, NE 68501.

Can presentations by an iconic system [pictures] and a linguistic system [print or audio] aid learning? Testsgiven fourth-to-sixth graders showed that they alternate between systems, using each to assimilate information. However, when content differed between the systems- and this information was presented simultaneously [visual + audio] - processing of the information was not as effective.

Media research traditionally has treated media as total, invariant systems, an assumption which has led to comparisons between media that predict one to be superior over others. What such research fails to acknowledge is that there are separate attributes or symbols of media stimuli, and the interaction of these components characterizes various media and contributes to the learning experience each affords. Thus, differences within a medium may be as great as those between media; and attributes within a media stimulus, possibly shared with other media, should receive major attention. Salomon clearly articulates this position: "Media's ways of structuring and presenting information--that is, their symbol systems--are media's most important attributes when learning and cognition are considered and should serve as the focus of our inquiry" (Salomon, 1979, p. 216). A symbol system is defined in terms of certain semantic and syntactic features (Goodman, 1976). It is a set of elements interrelated by syntactic rules or conventions and used in specifiable ways in relation to the referent. Linguistic symbol systems are language-based, entailing discrete elements which can be organized according to clearly defined syntactical rules. Semantic properties, however, can be am-

ECTJ, VOL. 30, NO. 3, PAGES 163-174 ISSN 0148-5806

This research was conducted while the author was with the Barkley Center, University of Nebraska, and was supported in part by researchfunds from that center.

164 ECTJ FALL1982

biguous; e.g., the word "bank" can mean a place to put money or ground bordering a lake. Iconic systems, which include pictorial representations such as drawings and photographs, are characterized by even more semantic ambiguity; pictures can be very dense in terms of meanings and information presented. Media are seldom associated with only one symbol system, and the complex media of television and film can present pictures, audio, and print in iconic or linguistic codes, which are perceived, stored, encoded, and retrieved by learners in different ways. The effectiveness of these various intramedia attributes has received research attention; however, the studies have had a variety of foci, and few have used symbol systems as a theoretical base. Some have compared the learning of word or picture pairs; others have focused on information transmission through single or multiple channels. Considerable research has also been devoted to the role of pictures accompanying written text or oral prose. One way of grouping previous research is by single- or combined-media comparisons. In examining single comparisons, or learning from print, audio, or pictures, the research presents some conflicting results, but generally shows no difference between the various presentations. In comparing narratives presented in print and audio form, no differences were found in the learning of younger children (Rohwer & Harris, 1975) and college students (Nasser & McEwen, 1976). Hartman's conclusions (1961) from an early review offer qualifications, however. He pointed out that audio has obvious advantages for presenting simple material to younger children with undeveloped reading skills; however, as the material becomes more complex, print becomes increasingly advantageous. In regard to comparisons of pictures and print, Baggett (1979) compared college students' recall of a story in text and silent film form and found that cued recall of structural statements was very similar for both media. Gropper (1966) and Levin (1973) also found no significant difference between learning from visual and verbal (print) presentations. Rohwer and Harris' study (1975), however, showed an advantage for print. The difference in results may be attributable

to content differences of passages, a point Rohwer and Harris noted in their discussion. This later study also isolated an interaction between subject characteristics and pictorial vs. auditory presentations. Audio was superior to pictures for fourth graders of high socioeconomic status (SES), but there was no difference between the two for the lower SES students. Indeed, the advantage of pictures and pictorial augmentation for low SES students was a recurring result. Although earlier theoretical views held that the transmission of redundant information through more than one channel did not produce learning superior to that through a single channel (Travers, 1967), research has only partially substantiated this position. Studies comparing print-plus-audio to single presentations generally support this conclusion, but most studies used single words as the stimulus (Severin, 1967; Van Mondfrans & Travers, 1964). Nasser and McEwen's study (1976), on the other hand, which dealt with college-level prose material, showed that print-plus-audio was superior to audio alone, but the dual presentation had no advantage over print-only materials. The increasing advantage of print for presentations of complex materials is again evident. In contrast to print and audio comparisons, which generally reveal no advantage for dual over single presentations, studies show that adding pictures to print or audio generally increases learning. The positive effect of pictures when used in conjunction with oral prose has been empirically validated across a number of subject and situational variables (Levin & Lesgold, 1978), and several studies have isolated picture effects when used with written materials. The effectiveness of pictures has been demonstrated in use with expository text (Koenke & Otto, 1969; Rasco, Tennyson, & BoutweU, 1975), stories (Peeck, 1974), and materials teaching concepts and rules (Tennyson, 1978). Other studies have isolated more specific effects. For example, Haring and Fry (1979) showed that pictures increased recall of main ideas in a story, but not nonessential details and descriptions. Goldberg (1974), on the other hand, showed that pictures could increase learn-

SYMBOLIC REPRESENTATIONAND LEARNING 165

ing of material not central to the objectives of the lesson. Still other studies have shown that pictures can serve both advance organizer and mathemagenic functions (Bransford & Johnson, 1972; Brody & Legenza, 1980; Snowman & Cunningham, 1975). In comparing combined presentations, studies have generally shown that materials using pictures and audio produce learning superior to that involving audio and print (Peng & Levin, 1979; Rohwer & Harris, 1975; Rohwer & Matz, 1975), pointing out the advantage of pictorial vs. printed augmentation of orally presented information. And finally, learning performance in three-media conditions does not differ significantly from performance in dual-media conditions (Rohwer & Harris, 1975). Although these studies provide some evidence as to the relative effectiveness of print, audio, and pictures and give some insight into processing differences, they fail to consider systematically the relationship between the three intramedia attributes and their symbol systems. To maintain experimental control, the comparative studies generally have presented redundant content in print, picture, and audio form. Content can be controlled, but since these three components represent different symbol systems, structural redundancy varies. On one hand, print and audio can present information that is redundant in both semantics and syntax. Although they are presented and processed via separate sensory modalities, they are both linguistically based systems and structure information in the same way, through words. Pictures, on the other hand, represent an iconic symbol system, whose structure differs from print or audio. Pictures offer many dimensions for coding information. In presenting depth of information, however, they lack the focusing quality of print and audio. A sentence can succinctly convey a piece of information which may be difficult to extract from the many cues provided by the picture. This research was designed to utilize a few experimental designs to provide a more comprehensive view of the effect of pictures, audio, and print on learning. Although most other research has emphasized still-picture augmentation of text or

stories, this research focused on the more complex media of television and film. The intent was to examine picture, print, and audio components, while systematically varying the content redundancy between them, to determine how these characteristics influence learning. The research intent was to consider communicative intent, symbol system, and functional relationship of picture, audio, and print in influencing cognition and learning. STUDY 1 Study I was designed to compare the learning of factual information from visuals, audio, and print. To make these comparisons, video and audiotapes were prepared so that the visuals, audio, and print presented the same content; students could obtain the information from any of the three media forms. It was proposed that certain combinations of print, audio, and pictures would have advantages and that instruction combining iconic and linguistic symbol systems would be superior. This position is in line with Paivio's (1971) dual coding theory maintaining that information can be represented by both pictorial and verbal codes which are functionally independent, though interconnected, cognitive systems. His theory contends that information representation by both image and verbal codes is more powerful than single representation. Thus, it was hypothesized that pictorial (iconic) augmentation of print or audio (linguistic) presentations should increase learning, and there should be no difference in learning between presentations of words in both print and audio and presentations of print or audio alone. It was also posited that there would be a significant relationship between subject age and learning outcomes. Research has shown that age is a critical factor in one's ability to remember and learn from pictures. Hoffman and Dick (1976) demonstrated that recognition memory for magazine pictures improved between 3 and 7 years of age, and Stevens and Siegel (1969) found an increase in performance across grades 3 through 7 for visual material. Dirks and Neisser (1977) also showed that memory for information presented in complex pictures increased between 6 years of age and adulthood.

166 ECTJ FALL1982

Method Subjects. Subjects were 201 fourth, fifth, and

sixth graders from a midwestern community. To ensure that all students could read the print material, a 2.5-grade reading level criteria was required. Subjects were randomly assigned to experimental conditions.

Instructional Treatments. The instructional

materials were prepared from a nonverbal Encyclopaedia Britannica film that presented factual information about the life of a cheetah. Seven instructional treatments were prepared by transferring the film to videotape and editing the materials to conform to research controls. 1. Visuals + print. Since the original film was nonverbal, print descriptions of each visual or visual sequence were prepared so that the print provided a verbal description of what was presented in the picture. For example, one visual depicted a close-up of a cheetah's paw showing toes. The print statement read, "They have long toes. They have claws." Reading level of the text was assessed through the Maginnis Readability Graph (Maginnis, 1969) and Dale-Chall Readability Formula (Dale & Chall, 1948). Both analyses rated materials at the primary reading level. In order to display the visual and print together, the print statement appeared as a caption and was generally one or two lines with approximately 24 characters per line. The visual and corresponding print statement were displayed for a total period of time representing one second per word. For example, a 10-word print description required 10 seconds of background video. This rate was selected on the basis of pilot tests and previous research showing that this rate allows time to process materials presented in both print and visuals. To ensure that the information in the visuals and print was redundant, a pilot test validation procedure was used. A comprehension test was submitted to a group of adults who viewed either the visual or print presentation. This testing revealed that not all questions could be answered from viewing the visuals alone, and the videotape was revised to strengthen the visual presentation.

2. Visuals + print + audio. This videotape contained an audiotrack iri addition to the visuals and print. The audio was prepared from the print materials and was synchronized so that each audio statement(s) began when the corresponding caption first appeared on the screen. 3. Visuals + audio. A videotape was prepared with only the visuals and audio. 4. Print + audio. A videotape was prepared which presented only print and audio. Print statements appeared over black. 5. Visuals alone. The visuals were presented without any audio or print display. 6. Print alone. Print statements were presented without any audio or pictorial display. 7. Audio alone. The program audio was recorded on audiotape. The materials were edited with a computer-controlled time-code system to ensure that the print descriptions (captions), corresponding pictures, and audio were synchronized and that the presentation time was constant across all conditions.

Instrument. The instrument consisted of a

23-question, multiple-choice comprehension test based on information presented in the instructional program. Reliability, as measured by Cronbach Alpha, was .73.

Experimental Design. The main analysis was

a posttest only, one-way ANOVA designed to test for achievement differences between the seven treatments and a control group. The control group was included to provide an index of students' prior knowledge and to determine whether or not the presentations were instructional. Secondary analyses were a series of stepwise multiple regression tests to determine the relationship between student age and sex and achievement outcomes.

Procedures. Students in treatment conditions viewed the appropriate materials and completed the paper-and-pencil test. The control group completed the test without viewing any of the materials.

Results
The one-way ANOVA was significant, F

SYMBOLICREPRESENTATIONAND LEARNING 167

TABLE 1 Study 1 Experimental Group Means and Summary of Tukey Follow-up Tests Experimental Group Control Visuals (V) Audio (A) Print (P) P+ A V+ P V + A V+P+A

n 23 25 24 23 26 27 26 27

Mean 14.43 17.88 18.38 18.70 19.88 20.70 22.00 22.19

Control 2.20 "* 2.22* 2.23* 2.17" 2.15" 2.17" 2.15"

Visuals (V) Audio (A)

Print (P)

P + A

V+ P

V+ A

2.18 2.20 2.13 2.11" 2.13" 2.11"

2.22 2.15 2.13" 2.15" 2.13"

2.17 2.15 2.17" 2.15"

2.09 2.11" 2.09*

2.09 2.07

2.09

aCritical difference between visuals and control for p < .05. *p < .05. (7,193) = 25.39, p < .05, and a f o l l o w - u p

Tukey test was employed to find which means were significantly different from one another. Results of the Tukey analysis, showing group means and critical differences between means, are presented in Table 1. The Tukey test showed that scores from treatment groups were all significantly higher than those from the control, indicating that the treatments did have an instructional impact. The Tukey test also revealed no significant difference in scores of students exposed to print, audio, and visual presentations. This result provides further validation that the information presented through the three modes was indeed redundant. Students learned equally well from print, audio, and visuals. C o m p a r i s o n s involving dual- with single-media attributes revealed several significant effects. As evident from Table 1, the visuals-plus-audio presentation led to significantly greater learning than either visuals or audio alone, and the combination of visuals-plus-print was significantly better than visuals alone. The visuals-plusprint presentation also produced greater learning than did the audio instruction. Dual-media comparisons generally showed no differences, with one exception; visuals-plus-audio was significantly better than print-plus-audio. This result is consistent with previous research (Peng & Levin, 1979; Rohwer & Harris, 1975; Rohwer & Matz, 1975) and illustrates the advantage of pictorial vs. printed augmentation of orally presented information. And finally, performance in the three-media condition was significantly better than all of the single pre-

sentations and was also superior to the print-plus-audio instructional treatment. Results of the stepwise multiple regression analyses and group means by age and sex are shown in Tables 2 and 3. The first regression analysis combined data for all eight groups and revealed that both age and sex were significant predictors of achievement scores, with age making the largest contribution. Despite the significant effects, however, the two variables together accounted for only 7% of the variance in achievement. Regression analyses were also run for each of the eight experimental groups. There was considerable variation in the contributions of age and sex to the explained variance and few significant effects. As can be noted from Table 2, age provided a significant contribution in predicting scores of children viewing the pictures alone and was also a significant predictor for the printplus-audio group. The multiple Rs were again modest, ranging from .00 for the visuals-plus-print-plus-audio group to .56 for the print-plus-audio group.

Discussion

The result that students learned equally well from print, visuals, and auditory presentations illustrates the facility of children in learning through the various modes and underscores the potential instructional effectiveness of pictures. This result is especially significant in view of the fact that the comprehension test was in print form and required children in picture conditions to translate the iconic code into a print-based

168 ECTJ FALL1982

TABLE 2 Summary of Results of Multiple Regression Analyses

Experimental Group
All groups combined Visuals (V) Print (P) Audio (A) P+ A V + P V+ A V+ P+ A Control **p < .01. *p < .05.

Independent Variable
Age Sex Age Sex Age Sex Age Sex Age Sex Age Sex Age Sex Age Sex Age Sex

F Value to Enter
10.80"* 4.28* 6.15* .11 2.13 1.56 2.73 1.48 10.87"* .22 .15 .05 .29 .23 --4.78* 2.95*

R
.23 .27 .46 .46 .30 .40 .33 .41 .56 .56 .08 .09 .11 .15 .00 .00 .43 .54

R2
.05 .07 .21 .22 .09 .16 .11 .17 .31 .32 .01 .01 .01 .02 .00 .00 .19 .29

TABLE 3 Mean Ratings of Achievement by Student Age and Sex

Experimental Group
Control Visuals (V) Audio (A) Print (P) P+ A V+ P V+ A V+ P+ A n

Age 9
9.00 15.40 16.25 16.33 16.25 21.75 22.33 22.00 28

Sex

10
14.11 17.33 18.33 19.22 18.33 20.00 21.73 22.55 73

11
14.25. 19.18 19.14 20.80 19.14 20.00 22.00 21.44 65

12 16.25 18.33 19.25 18.00 19.25 22.20 22.50 23.00 32

M 15.29 18.00 19.00 19.75 19.89 20.74 22.13 22.21 113

F 13.11 17.75 17.93 18.07 19.86 20.63 21.80 22.15 88

linguistic one. Students were evidently able to transfer their knowledge from one symbol system to another, an effect supporting Paivio's contention of the interconnectedness of iconic and linguistic systems. He maintains that nonverbal information can be transformed into verbal information, and vice versa. Results of this study generally support the original hypothesis that presentation of information through two-symbol or coding systems would be superior. The combination of pictures (iconic symbols) and audio or print (linguistic symbols) was superior to single presentations in all but one case. The combination of symbol systems evidently

exploits the potential of each and promotes a synergistic interaction. It appears that the two provide alternative means of processing information and are complementary. Students are able to alternate between modes and use each to its best advantage. Some speculations can be drawn as to the relative advantages of linguistic vs. iconic symbol systems by examining the treatments used in this study and considering the descriptive nature of the information presented. The pictorial presentation began with a full picture of the cheetah, which provided students with an overall referent. Students in the picture conditions did not have to evoke a mental image of the

SYMBOLIC REPRESENTATIONAND LEARNING 169

cheetah, which, depending on their background knowledge, could be accurate or inaccurate. Pictures were also an excellent means of presenting information regarding size, color, shape, and motion, all important descriptive elements for this subject matter. Although a picture was very efficient in providing a tot of information in a short time, it was not very good at isolating details. Close-ups and highlights were used to convey specifics. The linguistic presentation, on the other hand, was very good at conveying specifics, but was not good at providing an overall referent. The beginning sentence was "Cheetahs are big, wild cats." From this statement students presumably evoked some mental image of a cheetah, which was then modified as more specific information about characteristics (color, size, tail, etc.) was presented. Thus, students in print/ audio conditions processed specific facts that lead to an overall conception of the cheetah, while those in the picture conditions began with a composite image and continually dissected the overall referent to obtain specific information. When both pictures and print/audio were used together, however, students could use each to its best advantage, balancing the focusing, specific nature of print/audio with the broader, more replete referent provided by the pictorial representation. Each system could serve as an alternative representation of the information should there be any ambiguity. The pictorial presentation could clarify or serve as a reference point for the print/ audio, and the print/audio could serve as a focusing agent for pictorial detail. One exception to the superiority of a dual presentation of iconic and linguistic codes was that v i s u a l s - p l u s - p r i n t was not superior to the print alone. This result not only contradicts the theoretical framework, but also existing research demonstrating the effectiveness of pictorial augmentation of print (Goldberg, 1974; Haring & Fry, 1979; Koenke & Otto, 1969; Peeck, 1974; Rasco, T e n n y s o n , & Boutwell, 1975). Examination of means shows that scores from students were in the hypothesized direction, with the combined presentation promoting greater learning. The lack of significance may be due to the nature of the

materials and the way print and visuals were combined. While previous research has concentrated on combining still photographs and text, this study used print as an addition to motion pictures. The print appeared as captions; and it may be that the students, unaccustomed to this type presentation, concentrated primarily on the print to the exclusion of the picture. In this case, the full advantage of the pictures would not be realized, and the effect of their addition would be minimized. The problems with the print presentation in this study are freely acknowledged. Presentation of print via television is not typical, and external validity is sacrificed. The decision to present print, audio, and visuals via one medium was made to maintain internal validity and ensure that time of exposure was constant in all conditions. Future research should expand on these results, however, by presenting print in text form. The result that the print-plus-audio presentation did not have advantages over presentations in print, audio, or pictorial form underscores the structural redundancy of print and audio and supports previous research (Nasser & McEwen, 1976; Severin, 1967; Van Mondfrans & Travers, 1964). Although print and audio are processed via separate sensory modalities, they are both linguistic symbol systems and structure information in the same way, through words. This research suggests that for relatively simple material, linguistic meaning takes precedence over form. By the fourth grade students appear to be able to extract similar meanings from prose regardless of its presentation in print or auditory form. Results showed no differences between the three-media condition and the dual presentations involving visuals with either print or audio. As media forms were combined, however, student scores approached 100%. With this movement towards mastery, there was very little difference in scores of the top two groups, and a definitive conclusion regarding the comparative effectiveness of visuals-plus-print-plusaudio and visuals-plus-audio cannot be drawn. Although this result is consistent with the theoretical background and previous research involving children of similar

170 ECTJ FALL1982

ages (Rohwer & Harris, 1975), it is possible that the triple-media condition may be superior in presenting more complex material. Additional research with more difficult subject matter should be initiated to explore this possibility further. The results of the regression analyses supported the original hypothesis that there would be a significant relationship between age and learning outcomes, and the research also revealed that sex was a significant predictor. When data from all treatm e n t groups were combined, results showed a continual increase in scores from ages 9 through 12, and higher scores for males than for females. When separate regression analyses were computed by experimental group, age was found to provide a significant contribution in predicting scores of children viewing the pictures alone. Examination of the means showed a continual increase in scores from ages 9 through 11, with a leveling off from ages 11 to 12. It appears that there are developmental differences in children's ability to learn from visuals, and this study supports previous research showing that one's ability to learn from pictures generally improves with age. In summary, results of Study I provides a refinement of the old rule of thumb in education saying that "the more media channels used, the better." This research points out that the various media channels cannot be isolated from their symbol or coding systems. Combining audio and print, both of which present information through a linguistic or verbal symbol system, does not have an advantage over single presentations. On the other hand, representation of information by both pictorial and linguistic codes is generally more powerful than single presentations. The iconic system is presumably specialized in processing concrete objects and events, and the linguistic code in providing a specific focusing orientation, and the two can interact and work jointly in facilitating learning. STUDY 2 Study 2 was designed as a continuation of the systematic assessment of the relationship between the various intramedia com-

ponents and symbol systems of television/ film instruction and their effect on learning. Study 1 showed that the combination of pictures (iconic symbols) and audio or print (linguistic symbols) was generally superior to single-system presentations. It is important to remember, however, that the content in Study 1 was redundant; the same information was carried in visual, auditory, and print form. Complete content redundancy is atypical in audiovisual presentations, however. Because of the difficulty in picturing certain information, visuals are often supplemental or supportive, with the bulk of the content being carried by the audio or through print. On the other hand, certain tasks, especially procedural, are difficult to verbalize. In such cases a picture may indeed be worth a thousand words. The difficulties in presenting print via television were underscored in Study 1. Since television and film do not carry large amounts of print well and are not typically used for print presentations, it was decided that Study 2 would only deal with visual and audio components. In Study 2 the content presented in the visuals and narration was nonredundant; that is, while the video was relevant to the audio, it did not contain synonymous or redundant information. Students could obtain separate content from the visuals and narration. Results from Study 1 emphasized the supportive, interactive relationship between iconic and linguistic symbol systems. The focus of Study 2, on the other hand, was the independence of these two symbol systems. The research was concerned with student ability to process separately visuals and audio. Accepting Paivio's contention that verbal and nonverbal information are represented and processed in functionally independent systems, it was hypothesized that students could indeed process both and could learn the separate information in visuals and narration.

Method Subjects. Subjects were 117 fourth and fifth

graders from a midwestern rural area. Subjects were randomly assigned to experimental conditions.

SYMBOLIC REPRESENTATIONAND LEARNING 171

Instructional Treatments. The instructional

materials were again developed from the Encyclopaedia Brittanica film on the cheetah. Three treatments were prepared: 1. Visuals + audio. The video of this lesson was very similar to that used in Study 1, but different narration was developed so that the visuals and audio carried nonredundant information. The background video was relevant, but could not, by itself, convey the information presented in the audio. For example, the audio for a visual depicting a close-up of a cheetah's paw read: "Cheetahs cannot pull their claws into their paw." The narration generally presented specific facts--cheetahs can run 70 rnph, they stay with their mother for 18 months, they use their tail for balance and steering at high speeds, etc. The background video was generic; the footage emphasized the particular characteristic being discussed, but the specific detail was not conveyed by the visual alone. Following the procedures used in Study 1 the number of words in the narration determined the length of time a particular visual was displayed. Narration for each visual sequence was no longer than two sentences, and a one-second-per-word rate was used so that a 10-word description required 10 seconds of background video. The voice-over narration began at the edit point for each new visual sequence. To ensure that the visuals and audio carried nonredundant information, a pilot test validation procedure was used that was similar to the one in Study 1. A comprehension test was submitted to a group of adults who either viewed the visuals or heard the audio. Subjects viewing the pictures alone should have been able to answer questions testing pictorial information, but not those testing audio information. Subjects hearing the audio should have been able to answer questions testing this information, but not those testing visual information. Items which did not meet these criteria indicated problems with the instruction, and appropriate revisions were made in the videotape. 2. Visuals alone. The visuals were presented without any voice-over narration. 3. Audio alone. The program narration was presented via audiotape.

The original film materials were transferred to videotape and edited with a computer-controlled time code system. This system was necessary to ensure that the visuals and audio were synchronized and that the presentation time was constant across all conditions.

Instrument. The student instrument consisted of 41 multiple-choice questions incorporating two d e p e n d e n t variables. Twenty-one of the questions tested for acquisition of information presented in the narration. The remaining 20 questions tested for information presented in the visuals. The 20 visual-relevant questions were ones used in Study 1. Reliability of the test, as measured by Cronbach Alpha, was .78. The alpha for the visual questions was .55 and for the audio questions, .86.

Experimental Design. The design was a posttest only, one-way analysis to test for achievement differences between visuals, visuals-plus-audio, and audio treatments. Since there were two dependent measures testing for different information, two univariate ANOVAs were used.

Procedures. Students in the three groups

were presented with the appropriate instructional treatments and completed the paper-and-pencil test.

Results
The two one-way ANOVAs, one testing for information contained in the visuals and one for information carried in the narration, were both significant--visuals: F (2,114) = 11.29, p < .05; audio: F (2,114) = 129.08, p < .05. Tukey tests were used to find out which means were significantly different from each other. Results of the Tukey analysis showing group means and critical differences between means, are shown in Table 4. For group comparisons involving information carried in the visuals, the group hearing the audio presentation served as a control since the narration carried independent information and questions dealing with content carried in the audiotrack were not included in the visual part of the test. The Tukey test showed that scores of stu-

172 ECTJ FALL1982

TABLE 4 Study 2 Experimental Group Means and Summary of Tukey Follow-up Tests
Measure~Treatment n Mean Visuals Audio

Visual Questions Visuals Audio (control) Visuals + audio Narration Questions Visuals (control) Audio Visuals + audio

38 40 39 38 40 39

12.32 10.18 12.93 10.29 18.08 18.69

1.45a* 1.46

1.44*

1.44* 1.44"

1.43

aCritical difference between visuals and audio for visual questions. *p < .05. dents in the group seeing the visuals and the group viewing the audiovisual presentation were significantly higher than those

of children hearing the audio. This result provides additional evidence of the validity of the two dependent variables and shows that the two visual presentations had an instructional effect. There was no significant difference between scores of students viewing the visual presentation and those seeing the visuals with audio. Similar results were obtained for the analyses involving information carried in the narration. For these comparisons, the visuals treatment served as the control. The Tukey test revealed that scores of students in the audio group and audiovisual group were significantly higher than those from the visual group. There was no difference between scores of students hearing the audiotape and those viewing the audiovisual presentation. Discussion Results of this study support the original hypothesis that students can independently process visual and auditory information. Clearly, they learned from the visuals when independent, but related, information was presented in the narration, and vice versa. Children were able to process simultaneously the information carried in both visual and audio tracks. Since scores on narration questions were approximately the same for visuals-plus-audio and audio treatments, it can be concluded that the presence of visuals did not interfere with learning of the information presented in the audio track. Similarly, scores on visual-

relevant questions were approximately equal for visuals and visuals-plus-audio. The presence of narration did not appear to interfere with visual learning. But, although there was no interference, neither was there facilitation. Since the content carried in the narration could not be precisely conveyed visually, the background video provided only generic support. The presence of such video did not interfere, but neither did it facilitate, auditory learning. Thus, this study supports the contention of functionally independent iconic and linguistic coding systems and shows that the interactive effect between the two is minimized as content differences increase. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS This research aimed to assess systematically the potential effectiveness and optimal combination of pictures, audio, and print, especially as components of television and film instruction. Content r e d u n d a n c y across these three intramedia attributes was varied in two separate studies. Results showed that when content was the same in visual, audio, and print channels, younger students learned equally well from all modes, but combining pictures with print or audio generally maximized learning. By conveying information through both linguistic and iconic symbols, students were provided with complementary processing systems, and they could altemate between the two to obtain information. Capitalizing on the individual strengths of each mode, they could use each to its best advantage.

SYMBOLIC REPRESENTATIONAND LEARNING t73

When independent information was presented in the visuals and audio, however, a different pattern of results emerged. First, students were able to process and learn the separate information. The presence of visuals did not interfere with processing the audio, and vice versa. However, content differences meant that students could not alternate between modes to obtain information, a n d s u p p o r t i v e effects were minimized. The addition of generic visuals to narration did not increase auditory learning, and the addition of narration did not increase learning from visuals. It appears that if separate information is transmitted via pictures and audio, students can process each independently, but positive interaction b e t w e e n the two c o m p o n e n t s is minimized. In conclusion, this research confirms the importance of considering media symbol systems and their influence on learning. Results support the theoretical position that learners process pictorial and linguistic information through functionally independent, though interconnected, cognitive systems. Because this research u s e d television/film materials, results extend previous research, which used single words and static line drawings as treatments (Paivio, 1975; Severin, 1967; Van Mondfrans & Travers, 1964). By using a commercially distributed film as the basis for preparation of the instructional treatments, this research extends the theoretical position into more practical classroom applications. The conclusions of this study, however, point out the need for further research to define more closely the unique blend of symbol systems that characterizes various media and to determine h o w each symbol system can be used most effectively-singly and/or in combination--to promote learning. This research established broad effects under different conditions of content redundancy. Further research should aim toward more refinement of these conclusions and their application to instructional design. The kinds of pictures and their functions within particular instructional contexts should be examined, as well as the types of information, objectives, and content conducive to pictorial presentation.

Pictorial realism continuums have received considerable research attention (Dwyer, 1972), but other areas of physical/perceptual characteristics need to be explored. Picture size, color, and position, especially as used with print, are potential research variables. Physical characteristics should also be considered in relationship to the instructional task, function of the picture (motivational, interest arousing, or explicative), and the nature of the viewer.

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