Despite the importance of emotions in science education, research on affect remains sparse. A promising direction is to explore the role of immersive visualisation in evoking affective responses. We investigate whether touch-based zooming interaction with a tabletop visualisation of the tree of life evokes various affective responses, particularly, the epistemic affective responses of awe, curiosity, surprise, and confusion. Ten students participated in semi-structured interviews while interacting with the visualisation. Verbal utterances and interactions with the visual interface were videorecorded. Students verbal and non-verbal affective responses in relation to five evolutionary themes were analysed. Results revealed that students expressed all four affective responses while engaging the zooming feature, with awe and surprise most frequently uttered. Most affective responses were associated with the themes of biological relationships and evolutionary time. Awe was highly associated with evolutionary time, surprise with biological relationships, and confusion with both these conceptual themes. For eight participants, awe was the initial affective response generated after exposure to the dynamic tree of life. The study demonstrates that interacting with an immersive visualisation through zooming can induce affective responses in relation to multiple conceptual themes in evolution. The findings provide insight into multidirectional interconnections between affect, dynamic visualisation, and biology concepts.

One of the most important educational challenges in developing environmental literacy for sustainability is understanding systems thinking. For example, grasping the effects of humanity’s disruption of the natural carbon cycle is crucial for making informed choices about climate change. Although development of systems thinking skills is challenging, they could be promoted through interactive visual learning environments. In the present study, we explore pupils’ use and assessment of a newly developed interactive learning environment, termed “Tracing Carbon”, designed to support grade 7-9 pupils’ systems thinking skills in the context of the carbon cycle. Data were collected from two classes (n=63) that engaged with Tracing Carbon as part of their science class. Performance was assessed by analysing log files of interactive tasks. Further information was gathered from the number of errors and perceived difficulty in pupils’ responses to quizzes in the system. The results indicate that the errors made when performing tasks can be related to misunderstandings such as believing that trees obtain their nutrition from the soil rather than from carbon dioxide in the air. Moreover, the quiz items that were designated “easy” were associated with fewer mistakes and a lower perceived difficulty rating than quiz items designated as “hard”. Future qualitative analysis could reveal links between the hierarchy levels, the number and type of errors in both tasks and quizzes, and aspects of the communicated carbon cycle content.

School visits to science centers can provide valuable opportunities for pupils to engage with science content and practices different from the traditional classroom and raise pupils' interest in science and science careers. Teachers play a key role in the success of a visit by linking to classroom practice. Unfortunately, visits tend to be viewed as an isolated experience by teachers and pupils, wherein pre- and post-visit activities that actively integrate the visit into classroom practice are often lacking. While many science centers offer suggestions for such pre- and post-visit activities, teachers do not typically take advantage of them. Thus, it is imperative to explore teachers’ views on successful visits and barriers that may influence the experience for pupils. As part of a larger research project on success factors for school visits to science centers, we examined teachers views on success factors, motivations and barriers to visiting a digital science center in Sweden. Based on interviews and the accompanying literature, a questionnaire was developed and distributed to teachers in local compulsory schools. Responses from 50 teachers revealed that the most important success factors were a well-prepared program, that the content is conveyed visually, that the visit induces pupils’ curiosity, and that the activities are linked to the curriculum. Teachers most common motives for visiting were that it offers a unique experience from the classroom, that the visit is free and that the program considers pupils’ needs. The majority of the teachers conducted no or limited pre- and post-visit activities, although the science center offers lesson plans linked to the visit. Main obstacles to visits included public transport costs for suburban and rural area schools. Our results suggest that the design of a visit should also consider and support the practical constraints for teachers and schools. 

Rapid developments in educational technology in higher education are intended to make learning more engaging and effective. At the same time, cognitive load theory stresses limitations of human cognitive architecture and urges educational developers to design learning tools that optimise learners’ mental capacities. In a 2-month study we investigated university students’ learning with an AI-enriched digital biology textbook that integrates a 5000-concept knowledge base and algorithms offering the possibility to ask questions and receive answers. The study aimed to shed more light on differences between three sub-types (intrinsic, germane and extraneous) of cognitive load and their relationship with learning gain, self-regulated learning and usability perception while students interacted with the AI-enriched book during an introductory biology course. We found that students displayed a beneficial learning pattern with germane cognitive load significantly higher than both intrinsic and extraneous loads showing that they were engaged in meaningful learning throughout the study. A significant correlation between germane load and accessing linked suggested questions available in the AI-book indicates that the book may support deep learning. Additionally, results showed that perceived non-optimal design, which deflects cognitive resources away from meaningful processing accompanied lower learning gains. Nevertheless, students reported substantially more favourable than unfavourable opinions of the AI-book. The findings provide new approaches for investigating cognitive load types in relation to learning with emerging digital tools in higher education. The findings also highlight the importance of optimally aligning educational technologies and human cognitive architecture.

Previous research suggests that everyday expressions are commonly used in students’ descriptions of nutrient uptake. This study investigate a classroom context in year 5 with a focus on signs of scientific meaning-making about nutrient uptake with an animation as a resource in two different schools. In one of the schools there was also a teacher review. The aim of this study is to investigate the pedagogical affordances of scientific terms and everyday expressions in the animation and in classroom teaching. Further, students’ signs of scientific meaning-making at the meso and submicro organizational level in group discussions and written descriptions are analyzed and if taking part of a teacher review influenced the students’ use of scientific terms and everyday expressions.The results show that the students who had a teacher review use everyday expressions at the meso and submicro level to a greater extent than the students who did not have an teacher review. The everyday expressions are often used as a kind of translation from the scientific terms in the students’ drawings.

Visual images are crucial for communicating science in educational contexts and amongst practitioners. Reading images contributes to meaning-making in society at large, and images are fundamental communicative tools in public spaces such as science centers. Here, visitors are exposed to a range of static, dynamic, and digital visual representations accessible through various multimodal and interactive possibilities. Images conveying scientific phenomena differ to what extent they represent real objects, and include photographs, schematic illustrations, and measurement-based models. Depicting realism in biological objects, structures and processes through images differs with respect to, inter alia, shading, color, and surface texture. Although research has shown that aspects of these properties can both potentially benefit and impair interpretation, little is known about their impact on viewers’ visual preference and inclination for further exploration. Therefore the aim of this study is to investigate what effect visual properties have on visitors’ perception of biological images integrated in an interactive science center exhibit. Visitors responded to a questionnaire designed to assess the impact of three indicators of realism (shading, color, and surface texture) and biological content (e.g., cells and viruses) on participants’ preferences, perceptions of whether biological images depicted real objects, and their desire to further explore images. Inspired by discrete choice experiments, image pairs were systematically varied to allow participants to make direct choices between images with different properties. Binary logistic regression analysis revealed that the three indicators of realism were all significant predictors of participants’ assessments that images depict real objects. Shadows emerged as a significant predictor of preference for further exploration together with the presence of cells in the image. Correlation analysis indicated that images that were more often selected as depicting real objects were also more often selected for further exploration. We interpret the results in terms of construal level theory in that a biological image perceived as a realistic portrayal would induce a desire for further exploration. The findings have implications for considering the role of realism and preference in the design of images for communicating science in public spaces.

Rapid developments in educational technology awaken hopes for making learning more engaging and effective. At the same time, Cognitive Load Theory stresses limitations of human cognitive architecture and urges developers to design learning tools that help learners optimize their mental capacities. In a 1.5-month long study we investigated tertiary students’ use of an AI-enriched digital biology book comprising a 5000-concept knowledge base and algorithms that offer the possibility to ask questions and receive answers. Our aim was to identify and investigate differences between three types of cognitive load (CL), namely, intrinsic (ICL), germane (GCL) and extraneous (ECL), as well as their correlation with learning gain and usability perception. Findings show that non-optimal design, which draws learners’ cognitive resources from the task is linked with a lower learning gain and user satisfaction. The study contributes to new approaches on differentiating between cognitive load types and their relationship with learning from digital tools. The findings also emphasize the importance of optimally designing emerging educational technologies. 

Communicating evolutionary theory continues to demonstrate significant challenges. One particularly demanding area is comprehending evolutionary time scales. Furthermore, visual representations such as the Tree of Life usually incorporate temporal aspects but require interpreting the underlying biological concepts as well as the representational features used to convey evolutionary meaning.

In this paper, we investigate how users engage with the DeepTree exhibit, an interactive touch table visualization of a dynamic Tree of Life (Block et al., 2012). The main purpose of DeepTree is to visualize the relationship of all life on earth. Specific focus of this paper is to explore how a zooming interactive feature which enables users to move virtually from the origin of life to present day species, influences perception and understanding of evolutionary time associated with the tree metaphor. The aim of the study is to explore how the zooming feature affords new ways of understanding the information which the dynamic tree metaphor conveys, what properties of zooming interactions are associated with various temporal aspects and how moving in time is perceived.

A video recorded clinical, semi-structured interview was conducted with each participant while s/he interacted with the DeepTree application. The analytical method used to treat the generated data was a combination of deductive and inductive coding of the transcripts and accompanying visual recordings.

The findings suggest that DeepTree is a natural and intuitive touch-based interface for navigating the metaphor of biological relationships. Interacting with the visualization induced various positive affective reactions. However, in its present design, DeepTree may not completely support users' understanding of evolutionary time. The results indicate that zooming can be interpreted in different ways. This suggests that the embodied and immersive experience offered by such interactive tree applications might strongly influence users' temporal interpretations associated with evolution concepts if they are designed appropriately.

Despite the acknowledged importance of emotions and feelings in science education, systematic research concerning affect remains sparse. In this regard, a promising research field is the potential of immersive and/or interactive visualizations to enhance learning by promoting affective responses. In building upon our previous research with an interactive visualization, this study focuses on affective dimensions. The aim of the study is to investigate whether interacting with DeepTree, a dynamic visualization of phylogenetic relationships represented as a tree of life, induces the affective responses of curiosity, surprise, confusion and awe. And if so, to ascertain which features and experiences of interacting with the visualization promotes these affections.

Ten students were each interviewed during a clinical, semi-structured interview while answering questions and performing tasks during interaction with the DeepTree application. Data was collected using a video camera mounted above the tabletop capturing auditory, and visual information. In a synthesis of the literature, we formulated a predetermined affective framework to apply in the analysis of the data set to identify affective responses.

Piloting of the framework during a detailed analysis of three students’ transcripts and corresponding video material, preliminary findings reveal that the most commonly expressed affective response was awe followed by confusion and curiosity, with few utterances or experiences indicating surprise. Most conceptual aspects associated with elicited affective responses included time and the unity of life, and to a lesser extent, relationships between organisms and the diversity of life. A strong elicitor of affective responses was the “zooming” feature of DeepTree. Findings of this pilot study confirm previous research that immersive visualizations can induce and enhance affective responses. Encouragingly, the findings also validate the application of the framework as a systematic tool for identifying affective responses.

The work provides further insight into the potential influence of affect in learning science with visualizations.