An eye-tracking study of gaze guidance and visual integration effects on attention, learning and instructor social presence

This study used the gaze-cueing effect and split-attention principle to study the impact of gaze guidance and lecture recording format on attention, knowledge retention and instructor social presence. The authors analysed data from 250 participants in a mixed factorial experiment with eye-tracking, self-reported instructor social presence and a delayed knowledge measure as dependent variables. Results showed that when the instructor looked at the slide content, participants spent more time looking at it (η2p = 0.044), but instructor social presence decreased (η2p = .040). The strongest decrease occurred when the content and instructor’s image were separated in a picture-in-picture video (η2p = .107). In contrast, there was better knowledge retention when they were seamlessly integrated in a composite video (η2p = .017). The findings show that gaze cueing effects may depend on the video format, and instructors should use them strategically to balance attention and social presence.