What Can We Learn from Augmented Reality (AR)?: Benefits and Drawbacks of AR for Inquiry-based Learning of Physics

Emerging technologies such as Augmented Reality (AR), have the potential to radically transform education by making challenging concepts visible and accessible to novices. In this project, we have designed a Hololens-based system in which collaborators are exposed to an unstructured learning activity in which they learned about the invisible physics involved in audio speakers. They learned topics ranging from spatial knowledge, such as shape of magnetic fields, to abstract conceptual knowledge, such as relationships between electricity and magnetism. We compared participants' learning, attitudes and collaboration with a tangible interface through multiple experimental conditions containing varying layers of AR information. We found that educational AR representations were beneficial for learning specific knowledge and increasing participants' self-efficacy (i.e., their ability to learn concepts in physics). However, we also found that participants in conditions that did not contain AR educational content, learned some concepts better than other groups and became more curious about physics. We discuss learning and collaboration differences, as well as benefits and detriments of implementing augmented reality for unstructured learning activities.