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Empirical contributions
The present set of experiments makes three empirical contributions
to the field. First, this study shows strong and consistent
evidence that students who are asked to generate drawings (with
sufficient support) during reading a scientific text that describes a
causal sequence perform better than students who read without
drawing, both on a comprehension test (d = 0.85 in Experiment 1
and d = 0.52 in Experiment 2) and on a drawing test (d = 1.15 in Experiment
1 and d = 1.87 in Experiment 2). Thus, the generative
drawing effect can be extended to a new domain, and therefore
corresponds to Shavelson and Towne’s (2002, p. 4) recommendation
to “replicate and generalize across studies” as one of the six
essential scientific principles of educational research.
Second, this study shows strong and consistent evidence that the
quality of drawings that students generate during learning with a
scientific text that describes a causal sequence is positively related
to subsequent performance on tests of learning outcome including
a comprehension test (r = .623 in Experiment 1 and r = .470 in
Experiment 2) and a drawing test (r = .620 in Experiment 1 and
r = .615 in Experiment 2). Thus, the prognostic drawing effect can
be replicated and extended to a new domain, consistent with standards
for scientific research in education prescribed by Shavelson
and Towne (2002).
Third, this study shows that asking learners to draw pictures
during reading a scientific text (i.e., learner-generated drawing group
in Experiment 2) is more effective than simply providing drawings
(i.e., author-generated picture group in Experiment 2) both on
a comprehension test (d = 0.49) and a drawing test (d = 0.68). Similarly,
adding author-generated drawings (i.e., learner-generated
pictures + author-generated pictures group in Experiment 2) does
not improve the learning outcomes of students who also draw pictures
during learning (i.e., learner-generated pictures group in
Experiment 2) either on a comprehension test (d = −0.57) or a
drawing test (d = −0.15). In short, the act of drawing during learning
(with sufficient support) improves learning beyond the simple
provision of drawings.
4.2. Theoretical contributions
The results are consistent with the idea that drawing during learning
serves as a generative activity (Mayer & Wittrock, 2006;
Schwamborn et al., 2010; vanMeter & Garner, 2005; Wittrock, 1990).
That is, the act of drawing encourages learners to engage in generative
cognitive processing during learning such as organizing the
relevant information into a coherent structure, and integrating it
with relevant prior knowledge from long-term memory. In the
present study, positive effects of drawing were indicated with a comprehension
and a drawing learning outcome test, and therefore are
in line with the theoretical assumption derived from the GTDC that
benefits of drawing can be found if learning outcome tests are used
that are sensitive to the underlying process of drawing (cf., vanMeter
& Garner, 2005). Additionally, in our study the drawing activity was
supported in a way that was intended to help learners carry out the
underlying cognitive processes of drawing (i.e., selecting, organizing
and integrating) successfully. In this regard, results of the present
study might supplement the theoretical framework of learnergenerated
drawing by providing further evidence that benefits of
drawing defined by van Meter and Garner’s GTDC can diminish, if
no instructional support is given to constrain and structure the
drawing activity. However, a fuller understanding of the underlying
cognitive processes of drawing, and how these processes can
be influenced via drawing support, requires more direct measures
of cognitive processing during learning. Additionally, following the
idea that metacognitive processes of monitoring and regulation are
automatically activated by drawing (van Meter & Garner, 2005), a
fuller understanding of the metacognitive effects of drawings is also
required.
4.3. Practical contributions
The present study encourages instructional designers and instructors
to incorporate drawing activities into venues involving
learning from text, which we call the generative drawing effect. One
important feature of a successful drawing strategy that is present
in this study and in a previous study by Schwamborn et al. (2010)
is that the drawing activity was supported by providing a
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