This themed issue aims to present some current directions in cognitive load research. The contributions to this issue represent a compilation of symposia contributions to the 11th European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI), 2005, in Nicosia, Cyprus. These cognitive load symposia were focused on empirical and theoretical perspectives on designing powerful learning envir...

Smoking cessation failures are frequently thought to reflect poor top-down regulatory control over behavior. Previous studies have suggested that smoking cues occupy limited working memory resources, an effect that may contribute to difficulty achieving abstinence. Few studies have evaluated the effects of cognitive load on the ability to actively maintain information in the face of distracting...

Most information overload research has been done in cognitive load contexts and predominantly focused on normative decision-making process. This study suggests the need to divide information load into two dimensions: cognitive load that is found in prior research, and emotional load as a new dimension. The emotional dimension can affect the information overload that results from the prevalence ...

The current study examines the role of cognitive and perceptual loads in inattentional deafness (the failure to perceive an auditory stimulus) and the possibility to predict this phenomenon with ocular measurements. Twenty participants performed Air Traffic Control (ATC) scenarios-in the Laby ATC-like microworld-guiding one (low cognitive load) or two (high cognitive load) aircraft while respon...

While over the last decades, much attention has been paid to the mental workload in the field of human computer interactions, there is still a lack of consensus concerning the factors that generate it as well as the measurement methods that could reflect workload variations. Based on the multifactorial Cognitive Load Theory (CLT), our study aims to provide some food for thought about the subjec...

Two recent findings constitute a serious challenge for all existing models of interval timing. First, Hass and Hermann (2012) have shown that only variance-based processes will lead to the scalar growth of error that is characteristic of human time judgments. Secondly, a major meta-review of over one hundred studies of participants’ judgments of interval duration (Block et al., 2010) reveals a ...