The Effect of Using a Talking Head in Academic Videos: An EEG Study

This paper presents a study designed to understand the effect of using a talking head in academic videos frequently used in video-based learning approaches, such Massive Open Online Courses. The experiment consisted of exposing participants to videos about different types of open software licenses. Each participant was exposed to 3 videos, each with a different condition: instructor always presented (talking head condition), only instructor´s voice present (only audio condition), and instructor presented only at the beginning of the video (mixed condition). Dependent variables included cognitive load, and emotional states (valance and arousal) obtained with electroencephalography, a personal assessment of the difficulty of the material, personal opinion regarding the social presence and performance in a memory test. The results indicate an increase in the cognitive load in the mixed condition, which may have implications regarding the use of the talking head in the design of academic videos.