Textbook of Usability

b. 1946, Australia · Emeritus professor at the University of New South Wales

Also known as: John Sweller

John Sweller developed cognitive load theory at the University of New South Wales over the 1980s and 1990s. His central claim is that working memory is severely limited and that instructional materials should be designed to minimise unnecessary load on it, separating intrinsic load (inherent task difficulty) from extraneous load (imposed by poor presentation) and germane load (devoted to schema acquisition).

The theory has produced a long catalogue of empirical effects (the worked-example effect, the split-attention effect, the redundancy effect, the modality effect, the expertise reversal effect) that together provide some of the strongest evidence-based design principles available for instructional and interactive systems. Cognitive load theory now informs the design of dashboards, training materials and clinical decision-support displays, where preventing working-memory overload is a primary safety concern.