It is important when solving visuospatial problems to attend to information that is relevant to the solution. One challenge for learning to solve visuospatial problems occurs when problem domain neophytes incorrectly focus on visual information that is irrelevant and may interfere with the solution strategy. Moreover, these directors of attentional focus often consume resources in themselves, which may increase the learner's cognitive load and hinder learning. The current study will investigate the influence of preattentive and focused-attention visual cues on learning in an effort to direct the learner's attention to salient information without impeding learning.
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