Multimedia Principles

Let’s look at 7 research-based principles for the design of

multimedia messages

1. Multimedia Principle

Students learn better from words and pictures than from words alone.

The next slide is a description in words of how a tire pump works:

When the handle is pulled up, the piston moves up, the inlet valve opens, the outlet valve closes and air enters the lower part of the cylinder.

When the handle is pushed down, the piston moves down, the inlet valve closes, the outlet valve opens, and air moves out through the hose.

The next slide is a description using both words and pictures of how a tire pump works:

Is the message clearer when pictures and words are used well together?

2. Spatial Contiguity Principle

Students learn better when corresponding words and pictures are presented near rather than far

from each other on the page or screen.

Let’s look at a diagram of a tire pump where the words are a bit too far from the parts:

Now let’s look at a slide that shows the words and pictures closer to one another:

Is the second diagram easier to understand?

3. Temporal Contiguity Principle

Students learn better when corresponding words and pictures are presented simultaneously rather

than successively.

The next slide will present a textual description about rainfall. Please read it.

1. Cool moist air moves over a warmer surface and becomes heated2. Warmed moist air near the earth’s surface rises rapidly.3. As the air in this updraft cools, water vapor condenses into water droplets and

forms a cloud.4. The cloud’s top extends above the freezing level, so the upper portion of the

cloud is composed of tiny ice crystals.5. Eventually, the water droplets and ice crystals become too large to be

suspended by the updrafts.6. As raindrops and ice crystals fall through the cloud, they drag some of the air in

the cloud downward, producing downdrafts.7. When downdrafts strike the ground, they spread out in all directions, producing

the gust of wind people feel before the start of rain.8. Within the cloud, the rising and falling air currents cause electrical charges to

build.

The next slide will present a pictorial description about rainfall. Please look at it:

The next slide will be present both a pictorial and textual version:

Does the combination of words and pictures enable you to construct a better mental image?

4. Coherence Principle

Students learn better when extraneous words, pictures, and sounds are excluded rather than

included.

Let’s look at some examples:

5. Modality Principle

Students learn better from animation and narration than from animation and on-screen text.

6. Redundancy Principle

Better transfer occurs when animation and narration are not combined with printed text. When pictures and words are both presented

visually, it can overload visual working memory capacity.

7. Individual Differences Principle

Design effects are stronger for low-knowledge learners than from high-knowledge learners and for high-spatial

learners than for low-spatial learners.