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Psychological Science and Education
2025. Vol. 30, no. 4, 56–68
doi:10.17759/pse.2025300404
ISSN: 1814-2052 / 2311-7273 (online)

Engagement in Online Learning: a Pilot Study

 
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Abstract

Context and relevance. Research utilizing computer vision methods represents a novel, promising, and highly relevant direction in education. It opens up opportunities for applying neuroscience to the development of scientifically grounded pedagogical approaches aimed at improving the quality of education. Objective. This study aims to determine the relationship between the visual design features of educational video content and engagement components (both cognitive and emotional). Hypothesis. The psychophysiological components of students' cognitive and emotional engagement during the viewing of educational video content (in the context of online learning) are positively associated with a polylogic format of material presentation in video lectures, the use of concrete examples, and the presence of questions directed by the lecturer to the audience. Methods and materials. During the viewing of video lectures and the completion of subsequent tasks, changes in skin electrical activity and gaze movement were recorded. Skin electrical activity was measured using the NTrend-BIO biobracelet, while gaze coordinates were tracked using the NTrend-ET500 eye tracker. Based on the collected data, standard metrбиобраслетics of emotional engagement, valence changes, attention, and interest were calculated using the "Neurobarometer" software package (developed by AO "Neurotrend"). Results. The experiment revealed a relationship between cognitive engagement and the visual design features of educational video content. Attention metrics were significantly higher among participants who watched video lectures with questions addressed directly to them. Emotional engagement metrics were significantly higher when participants completed tasks than during video viewing. Eye-tracking metrics further demonstrated that respondents focused more on video sequences featuring a single lecturer or slides rather than on dialogic/polylogic formats with multiple instructors. Conclusions. The pilot study provided preliminary data suggesting that engagement levels are influenced by specific visual design features of educational video content. These findings can be taken into account when developing an "ideal model" for online courses.

General Information

Keywords: erratum, schizophrenia, lipidomics, transcriptomics, mass spectrometry, corpus callosum

Journal rubric: Educational Psychology

Article type: scientific article

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17759/pse.2025300404

Funding. The study was supported by the TSU Development Program ("Priority 2030") NU 2.3.1.23 IG.

Supplemental data. Supplemental data. Datasets аvailable from https://doi.org/10.48612/MSUPE/ezg5-na5u-u6h2

Received 28.10.2024

Revised 10.02.2025

Accepted

Published

For citation: Gorchakova, O.Yu., Filkina, A.V., Larionova, A.V., Tolstova, M.A. (2025). Engagement in Online Learning: a Pilot Study. Psychological Science and Education, 30(4), 56–68. (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.17759/pse.2025300404

© Gorchakova O.Yu., Filkina A.V., Larionova A.V., Tolstova M.A., 2025

License: CC BY-NC 4.0

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Information About the Authors

Olesya Y. Gorchakova, Junior Researcher at the Center for Cognitive Research and Neuroscience, National Research Tomsk State University, Tomsk, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7571-0360, e-mail: avendus@mail.ru

Alexandra V. Filkina, Candidate of Science (Psychology), Research Fellow, Center for the Sociology of Education, Institute of Education, National Research Tomsk State University, Tomsk, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7026-7059, e-mail: lexia@inbox.ru

Anastasia V. Larionova, Candidate of Science (Psychology), Tomsk State University, Tomsk, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8523-2913, e-mail: anpavlar@mail.ru

Maria A. Tolstova, Candidate of Science (Philology), Associate Professor, Head of the Center for Cognitive Research and Neuroscience, National Research Tomsk State University, Tomsk, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0008-6442-0860, e-mail: tolstova_11@mail.ru

Contribution of the authors

Gorchakova O Yu — development of the research idea; conceptualization of the hypothesis; development of the research methodology; writing and formatting the manuscript; research planning; participation in the interpretation of results

Filkina A V — theoretical analysis and literature review; annotation of sources; participation in the development of research instruments; discussion of results; manuscript editing

Larionova A V — application of statistical data processing methods; interpretation of cognitive and emo-
tional engagement metrics; writing the “Methods and Materials” section; contribution to the formulation of conclusions

Tolstova M A — conducting the experiment; data collection using an eye tracker and a biobracelet; data analysis in the “Neurobarometer” software package; preparation of data visualization

All authors participated in the discussion of the results and approved the final text of the manuscript

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest

Ethics statement

The study was reviewed and approved by the Ethics Committee of Tomsk State University of Psychology and Education (report no 230711_A4_16, 2023/07/11)

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