The impact of question guidance and cues on learners’ online multimedia learning outcomes: the mediating role of cognitive load

Online multimedia learning is a popular teaching approach. Based on the cognitive load theory and the learning process model, question guidance reduces cognitive load by reducing attention to unnecessary material and improving learning effectiveness. Moreover, according to the attention guidance hypothesis, cues can help learners allocate attentional resources better. This study created a mediated moderation model to explain how question guidance and cues affect online multimedia learning. We collected and analyzed data from university students, where question guidance significantly and positively predicted the retention and transfer test results, and cognitive load significantly and negatively predicted the retention test scores. Additionally, it was found that cues moderated the impact of question guidance's impact on online multimedia learning. The facilitation of learning-by-question guidance was weakened with cues compared to without cues. Furthermore, cognitive load mediated the effects of question guidance and cue interactions on learning outcomes. When cues were absent, the use of question guidance could reduce the total cognitive load and intrinsic cognitive load, which was conducive to maintaining the improvement of retention test scores. However, when cues were present, the positive effect of question guidance was reduced, and the impact on maintaining test scores was also reduced.