Effectiveness of Video on Students' Success at Solving Problems

An analysis of video-enhanced physics problems where video was used as a visual representation resulted in the following conclusions:

1. Video [used in this context] does not always enhance students' ability to correctly solve a problem even when it is properly designed.
2. In some instances, [depending on multiple variables] video may be effective for helping students visualize a problem to the extent that it helps them correctly solve the problem.
3. Video, and multimedia in general, may be most effective for use in multimedia-focused problems where information necessary for solving the problem is contained in the multimedia. Thus, an additional step of observation is added to the problem-solving heuristic.

It is believed that animation used in this context would produce similar results. In general, these are called multimedia-enhanced problems.