Abstract:

Emerging technologies considerably broaden research possibilities and bring new insights into well-established areas of study such as metacognitive processes in learning. Next to the behavioral assessments, traditional methods for inferring cognitive processing in this context have been interviews and self-reporting measurements. These methods, however, have limitations as they involve subjective judgments and cannot capture the temporal fluctuations in cognitive processes. Regarding this, the need for an objective measurement that directly reflects cognitive processing during learning tasks has been recognized. Therefore, the application of eye-tracking technology has been proposed to investigate cognitive activities in the process of learning. Utilizing eye movement measures obtained by this technology offer the opportunity to validate assumptions about individuals' gaze patterns and possible attention during the interaction with the learning content. Next to basic text only learning materials, it is especially multimedia learning materials, encompassing both visual and verbal instructional messages, which are widely employed in various educational settings. Despite their common usage, only recently a research focus on understanding how specifically the cognitive activities manifest in multimedia learning has arised. This contribution introduces the use of advanced eye-tracking technologies in experimental research of metacognitive processes occurring during learning text-based and multimedia materials. Theoretical, methodological and instrumental aspects are discussed in the context of the preliminary analysis of collected empirical data.

Keywords:

Metacognitive learning processes, self-regulated learning, eye tracking, experimental study.