| Sumario: | Highly interactive and complex content within e‐learning induces high levels of intrinsic load. Self‐regulated effort represents one strategy that may help learners overcome such issues within e‐learning. Using intrinsic load items representative of content complexity, germane load items representative of learning, and self‐regulated effort items representative of effort, this study analysed survey responses from a group of university students (n = 1,471) who participated in e‐learning courses in South Korea. The results showed that intrinsic load had a negative relationship with germane load, self‐regulated effort had a positive relationship with germane load, and intrinsic load positively moderated the relationship between self‐regulated effort and germane load. These results add to what current research states about the ability to overcome the processing of complicated content through higher levels of student effort. Lay Description: What is currently known about the subject matter: High levels of effort lead to learning.More complex contents often lead to less learning.Currently, there is no clear answer to how challenging contents changes the relationship between effort and learning. What the paper adds to this: Effort and content complexity interact together in a way that impacts learning significantly.This paper shows that in situations where content complexity is high, learners who try hard will be able to overcome this difficulty. The implications of this study's findings for practitioners: This research shows the important for practitioners (instructors) in the calibration of their contents.Also, it shows that practitioners (instructors) must seek to understand their learners in the creation of their teaching materials.
|
|---|