Investigating the role of hand perspective in learning from procedural animations

Background Research indicates that animations presenting procedural instructions lead to better learning if the animation displays the procedural task from a first‐person perspective (over‐the‐shoulder) compared to a third‐person perspective (face‐to‐face). Aims This study extends view‐perspective research by investigating whether the observation of human hands completing manipulative tasks in an animation are necessary or not. Sample Sixty university students participated in the study. Method Participants studied two knot‐tying animations from a first‐person perspective showing hands, or a third‐person perspective showing hands, or a first‐person perspective without showing hands. Results Results showed that studying first‐person perspective animations resulted in higher performance on a knot‐tying task and recognition task (but not transfer task) than studying the third‐person perspective animations. The strongest effects were gained from the first‐person perspective animations showing hands, although comparable learning outcomes were often found with the no‐hands perspective animations. In addition, spatial ability was found to influence knot‐tying and recognition performance, while gender minimally interacted with performance in the different viewing perspective conditions. Conclusions Hand‐manipulative task are learned most optimally from animations when presented from a first‐person perspective, while it is not necessary to show the hands.