Visual-digital writing instruction and its effects on creativity, motivation, multiliteracy awareness, and writing anxiety in pre-service EFL teachers
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: The rapidly increasing transformation of education demands a new look at how pre-service teachers of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) are prepared for writing instruction. While multimodal communication increasingly dominates education, writing pedagogy in many teacher training programs remains traditional and text-centered, leaving pre-service teachers to face a heavy cognitive and emotional burden. This study explores how a visual-digital writing model affects four learner outcomes: writing anxiety, intrinsic motivation, creativity, and multiliteracy awareness. By introducing the concept of Cognitive Load Diffusion (CLD), the study explains how meaning-making through visuals and digital design can reduce linguistic pressure and emotional burden while facilitating learners’ creative engagement. A quasi-experimental design was used with 150 pre-service teachers enrolled in the ELT department at a large public university in Turkey; two intact class sections were randomly assigned to condition, with the experimental group (N = 75) receiving a design-focused, multimodal curriculum with visuals, color, and layout, and the control group (N = 75) receiving a traditional, paragraph-based, text-centric writing curriculum. Both sections were taught by the same instructor to control for instructor effects. The four principal outcomes were measured with the Second Language Writing Anxiety Inventory (SLWAI; [6]), the Attitude/Motivation Test Battery (AMTB), the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking (TTCT), and a Multiliteracy Pedagogical Awareness Scale (MPAS), and were analyzed with a one-way Multivariate Analysis of Covariance (MANCOVA) controlling for pre-test writing anxiety. The multivariate effect of instructional method was significant, Wilks’ Λ = 0.80, F(4, 144) = 7.85, p < .001, η² = 0.20; follow-up ANCOVAs indicated that the experimental group reported significantly lower writing anxiety and significantly higher intrinsic motivation, creativity, and multiliteracy awareness than the control group (all p < .001). A researcher-developed, 24-item process-perception questionnaire, resolved by exploratory factor analysis into four sub-dimensions (perceived cognitive effort, emotional comfort, task clarity, and creativity support), was additionally administered to the experimental group only, to help describe the cognitive and affective process underlying these outcomes. Qualitative data from weekly reflective design journals and end-of-treatment reflections, analyzed thematically, converged with the quantitative results, suggesting that visual-digital instruction reduced participants’ sense of linguistic pressure and supported creative agency.
Source: Discover Education
Author: Figun Dinçer
Institution: Bursa Uludağ Üni̇versi̇tesi̇
Language: English
Subfield: Literature and Literary Theory
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $1,390
OpenAlex ID: W7221834980