Presented by Sarah Vornholt at the Annual Conference of the Visual Resources Association, April 3rd - April 6th, 2013, in Providence, Rhode Island. Session #13: Pedagogical Studies in Visual Literacy ORGANIZER/MODERATOR: Mark Pompelia, Rhode Island School of Design PRESENTERS: Diana Carns, University of Massachusetss Dartmouth "Constructing Meaning: Integrating Text, Images, and Critical Questioning" Ellen Petraits, Rhode Island School of Design "Visual Literacy for Visual Learners: Relating Research Skills to Haptic Skills" Kelly Smith, Lafayette College "Image Seeking and Use by Graduate History Students: Avenues to Incorporating Visual Literacy" Sarah Vornholt, University of Hawai'i at Manoa "Visualizing the Article: An Exploratory Study of Undergraduates' Educational Reactions to Images in Scholarly Articles" Following the popular Visual Literacy Case Studies session that premiered at the 2012 annual conference, this session follows that same purpose while expanding the definition of what it can mean while meeting in Providence, Rhode Island—the Creative Capital, a city that serves as a factory for and of non-traditional learners. As background: A term first coined in 1969, visual literacy, according to the Association of College and Research Libraries “Visual Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education,” “is a set of abilities that enables an individual to effectively find, interpret, evaluate, use, and create images and visual media. Visual literacy skills equip a learner to understand and analyze the contextual, cultural, ethical, aesthetic, intellectual, and technical components involved in the production and use of visual materials. A visually literate individual is both a critical consumer of visual media and a competent contributor to a body of shared knowledge and culture.”

1. Visualizing the Article
An Exploratory Study of
Undergraduates’ Educational
Reactions to Images in Scholarly
Articles
Sarah Vornholt
MLISc
University of Hawai’i at Manoa
Visual Resource Association 2013 Annual Conference – Pedagogical Studies in Visual Literacy

2. PROBLEM STATEMENT
{why was this research done?}

3. Research Aim
The aim of this research is to explore
undergraduate underclassmen’s
interactions with scholarly
communication and in what manner the
inclusion of images impact these
students’ educational interest.
Research Question: What impact will
images in scholarly articles have on
undergraduate underclassmen?

4. METHODOLOGY
{how the study was conducted}

5. Art History: Artist John Sloan
Business: Conscious Capitalism
History: Homelessness of African-Americans
Sociology: Fatherhood in Popular Culture
ARTICLE TOPICS

7. John Sloan: Clown Making Up
Fathers on the Small Screen

10. Research Population
• 34 underclass (freshman
and sophomore)
undergraduate students
from the University of
Arizona campus in
Tucson, Arizona
• Non-probability accidental
sampling
University of Arizona
Campus

11. RESULTS & DISCUSSION
{what the study discovered and how the data
was interpreted}

12. Participant Demographics
Demographic Data
• Average time per
participant (1st segment)
was 1:12.
• Quickest time 14 minutes
• Birthdates range from
1992-1995
• Mean year 1994
Generation Z
Learning Styles

13. Image Statements
AURAL LEARNERS
“This article [John Sloan: Clown
Making Up] was memorable, because
of the image it instilled in my head.”
VISUAL LEARNERS
“Aside from the content, I loved
the pictures… The pictures were
my favorite about the style
because I am a visual person.”
“[Homelessness in the Colonies,
Least Interesting] Because [I]
really am unfamiliar with the
topic [I] had to paint my own
image and try to connect what
they were saying with what it
might have looked like.”
VERBAL LEARNERS
“I like to see pictures while I
read, it helps me understand
what the article is about.”

14. Illusory Image
“It had pictures of
families from a
different point in
history”
“It was a picture of
what the character
[sic] were doing”
“I think the book
Goodnight
[M]oon.”
From the article Fathers in Popular Picture Books:

15. CONCLUSION
{what this all means and issues discovered
along the way}

16. Final Thoughts
Practical Implications
• Decorative, passive images
– In the true scholarly publishing
atmosphere, the images included
would most likely act as
evidence and be essential to the
development of the argument.
Conceptual Possibilities
• All learning styles are in one way or
another impacted by the inclusion of
images in scholarly articles.
• Generations Z are the growing user
population for academic resources.
Guess How
Much I Love You
by Sam
McBratney, Ill.
By Anita Jeram

17. Suggestions for Further Research
• An archival study to provide a comprehensive
introduction to the amount of images
published in scholarly journals from a variety
of disciplines
• Conducting exploratory interviews with
university students
• The replication of experiments by Gibson &
Zillmann (2000), Zillmann, Knobloch & Yu
(2001), Knobloch et al. (2003), and/or
Sargent (2007)
• Future studies can investigate the illusory
image phenomenon

18. Thank You!
Contact Information:
Sarah Vornholt, MLISc
University of Hawai’i
sarahiv@hawaii.edu