October 31, 2025 – 1:00 p.m. On-site and online session (Room M204, Faculty of Psychology and Speech Therapy). Language: English.
Digital-Savvy or Lost in Transition? How Digital Media Influence Early Adolescents’ Learning in the Classroom
Angelica Ronconi
University of Padova
As schools worldwide continue integrating digital devices into everyday teaching, understanding how these technologies affect students’ learning is more crucial than ever. This talk will present a series of experimental studies exploring how digital learning environments shape early adolescents’ cognitive, metacognitive, and emotional processes.
The first part will focus on the screen inferiority effect, that is, the well-documented finding that students often understand texts better when reading on paper than on screens. The studies presented will investigate why this occurs and whether it depends on individual and classroom factors. In particular, these three studies examine how verbal and visuospatial working memory, reading self-efficacy, and classroom practices –such as text highlighting or the dominant teaching modality (paper- vs. digital-based)– influence students’ understanding of digital texts.
The second part will address media multitasking during video-based learning, a widespread habit among adolescents. By simulating real-world situations –such as receiving text messages while watching instructional videos– the last study examines how multitasking affects cognitive load, metacognitive monitoring, and comprehension, both immediately and after a delay. I will also discuss the moderating role of working memory in helping some students cope with competing demands.
The talk will highlight how these findings contribute to a broader understanding of the complex interplay between digital media, individual characteristics, and classroom practices. It will conclude by considering implications for teaching and the design of digital learning environments that promote mindful, self-regulated engagement with technology.
Bio
Angelica Ronconi is a research fellow at the University of Padova. Her work investigates how students learn and make sense of information in digital environments, with a focus on the cognitive and metacognitive processes involved in reading and learning from videos. Her research examines how individual characteristics –such as working memory, reading motivation, and classroom practices– influence students’ perception of cognitive load, epistemic emotions, comprehension, and metacomprehension when learning with digital media. Through experimental and classroom-based studies, her research seeks to clarify the mechanisms underlying digital learning challenges and to inform more reflective, evidence-based uses of technology in education.
