I hate subtitles

When I watch a French film subtitled in English, I make a conscious effort to avoid the subtitles as I find them distracting and feel that they impair my appreciation of the film. My husband, who has a slightly inferior command of the language, finds it helpful to refer to the translation occasionally. If he were to watch the same film again however, he would be as distracted by the subtitles as I am.

Reading Kalyuga's (2000) article, 'When using sound with a text or a picture is not beneficial for learning' I found parallels with the subtitle story.

Stepping back for a second, the theory of cognitive overload states that too much of the same sensory input is too much for the brain to handle and results in negative learning outcome. Similarly, simultaneous input to two different senses has the same effect - cognitive overload. One technique to overcome this is to follow a visual with an auditory explanation.

My reference to the subtitles becomes relevant when one considers an experienced learner as compared to a novice learner. The latter has been shown to respond well to visuals with accompanying text while the former finds them distracting and prefers visuals only.

Justification for ongoing value of an e-learning module often includes reference to the ability to use a module as an ongoing reference or job aid. It would be worth considering this in the design stage and providing the ability to not only disable any audio (even when it follows the visual) but also provide accompanying text that can be disabled for the returning experienced learner.

The challenge then becomes one of 'navigation and interactivity' but that's tomorrow's reading.