BECE. Newsletter 

Vol.8, No.1, 2021 1060 

 

 

 

 

Is Media Multitask Bound to Negatively Affect Online 

Learning? 

By Chen, J., Lin, H., & Liao, X. 
Correspondence to: Chen, J., School of Education, Hunan University of Science 

and Technology, China. Email: jingjunchenpsy@163.com 

EDIA multitasking is generally considered to be one of the main nega-

tive factors affecting online learning, and this negative impact could 

be relatively complicated. A study published in Modern Educational Tech-

nology conducted empirical research on instant message interference in stu-

dents’ mathematics video learning, and researchers compared the learning ef-

fects of 54 eighth-grade students under different interference conditions. The 

study adopted the incoordinate control group, setting one of the groups with 

insufficient media multitasking experience as the control group (LMM=14), 

and considering the other three groups with rich experience as the treatment 

group (HMM1=14, HMM2=14, HMM3=12). Using the One-way Repeated 

Measures Anova, with the interference amount of instant message as the in-

dependent variables and the post-test results of mathematics video learning, 

the main outcomes are concluded as follows: 

 Within the limited learning period, even students with rich media 

multitasking experience the learning effects of them will be affected 

by the negative impacts of the frequency increasing of dealing with 

multitasks, which is the “frequency effect”; 

 For students with rich experience, the instant messaging interference 

does not affect the learning effect within certain limits, and the 

learning effects gradually decline when the limit went beyond. 

This study proposes the following suggestions: 

On the one hand, educators can optimize the media multitask through 

training students’ ability, so as to reduce the interference of multitasking on 

online learning. On the other hand, it is more realistic to guide learners to 

control irrelevant multitasking in the process of online learning within a cer-

tain frequency range than to try to prevent teenagers from taking on media 

multitasking. 

 

Source: Modern Educational Technology, 2021; 31(3):50-56. 

 
 

 

M