We’ve been seeking academic research regarding the impact of audio, visual, and audiovisual messages . As part of our ongoing research we discovered a blog called Podagogy, a site dedicated to exploring the “potential of podcasting, RSS, and other technologies for delivering instructional content and academic support.”
On this fascinating blog, we stumbled upon a post called Visual versus Audio Messages where Professor Randy Meredith concludes that:
I find some encouraging implications regarding the use of podcasting and recorded audio as an effective teaching and learning tool.
- These findings support many earlier studies indicating recorded audio narrative is an effective medium for communicating information.
- Whether the delivery system is educational podcasting or audio cassettes may be less important than the quality and relevance of the audio recording.
- Audio leads video. That is, the video track must logically follow the audio track to be most effective.
- If audio does communicate the majority of information in a recorded story, it may be less important in some contexts (and therefore less expensive) to produce effective educational podcasts and audio recordings.
The most compelling message is “Audio leads video”.
Meredith writes that research has “clearly demonstrated the audio channel carries the bulk of the information in an audiovisual study. Further, results indicated the amount of learning was essentially the same for the audio only messages and the audiovisual messages. Audiovisual messages were found to be less consistently effective, depending on the way visuals were used to support the narrative audio. Audiovisuals organized in a logical sequence following the narrative significantly enhanced learning and recall. Audiovisuals presenting images as illustrations, without a logical sequence were far less effective in promoting learning and recall. The surprising bottom line was that audio alone provided the same level of cognitive satisfaction compared to audiovisual news story, and the information content delivered via audio comprised the majority of the information remembered by participants.”
If you have any links or information you’d like to share with us regarding audio communication, cognitive retention of audio messages, the impact of audio, visual, and audiovisual messages we’d love to hear from you!
