The Effects of Multitasking on Out-of-Classroom Learning

An important question is whether multitasking disrupts comprehension and learning. Tran, Carrillo, and Subrahmanyam (2013) found that college students often multitask when reading and studying for school. The cognitive load theory predicts that multitasking during a primary learning task will negatively impact learning (Schnotz & K????rschner, 2007); however, research has produced conflicting results (Subrahmanyam et al., 2013; Hembrooke & Gay, 2003). We examined the effect of multitasking while engaged in one of two tasks: reading or modular arithmetic. Modular arithmetic problems are novel and required the participants to learn how to solve them, this may have been more challenging. In contrast, reading is a common activity among college students, perhaps reading may not have been disrupted by multitasking because it has been practiced extensively. Findings suggest that for familiar tasks, multitasking may not have a negative effect, but multitasking when learning something new may produce a disruptive effect on learning