Preguntas de comprensión audiovisual sobreimpresas: propuesta para el aprendizaje de segundas lenguas.

Audiovisual comprehension activities are complex, especially in a foreign language. On the one hand, there is a confict of visual attention between viewing a video and completing a written task simultaneously. On the other hand, paying attention to the image, the audio, and the activity at the same time can lead to working memory overload. This paper describes an innovative proposal that can help limit this complexity in the felds of teaching and testing second languages: the use of embedded comprehension questions in the form of subtitles and synchronized with the relevant fragments. The proposal is a result of a doctoral dissertation in which a multiphase mixed methods design was employed. Participants were researchers in teaching Spanish as a Second Language (SSL), Spanish linguistics and/or the use of educational technologies, and SSL university teachers and students. Overall, informants had positive opinions about this methodology. Quasi-experimental studies revealed that imprinted questions did not have a statistically signifcant efect on SSL students' audiovisual comprehension test performance. However, imprinted questions did increase the amount of time that test-takers watched the video in a statistically signifcant way. The latter suggests that this technique reduces the confict of visual attention between viewing the video and completing the task. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]