Effects of AR on Cognitive Processes: An Experimental Study on Object Manipulation, Eye-Tracking, and Behavior Observation in Design Education

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. Abstract section, “We explore…, examining how AR can enhance learners' spatial reasoning and visualization skills. The objective is to understand the impact of AR on cognitive processes related to spatial design and to highlight the need for more effective educational tools to improve learning outcomes.” The statement of the research purpose is inconsistent with the subsequent research content. This study compared the eye movement and operation behaviors of two groups of subjects (3D space design background and other backgrounds) when using AR devices. How do the results of this study explain "how AR can enhance learners' spatial reasoning and visualization skills" and "highlight the need for more effective educational tools to improve learning outcomes"? Even how did this study reach the conclusion that "Therefore, educators should design tailored AR environments to suit diverse learning groups and thus optimize educational content development"?
2. Literature Review section, please clearly discuss the relationship between gaze behaviors, cognitive characteristics, and cognitive processing.
3. Research Methods and Process section, the descriptions of items such as subject background, experimental design, experimental process, data collection, data processing, and data analysis are rather messy and difficult to understand.
4. Line 265-Line 274 describes the subject characteristics twice.
5. Line 299, “These devices recorded gaze metrics, such as fixation duration, saccades, and gaze patterns, which provided insights into participants' visual attention and cognitive processing”. However, the research results did not include data on fixation duration, saccades, and gaze patterns.
6. Line 342, “Space Utilization, which examined how participants engaged with both real and AR environments during the visualization process”. Please further explain which data was analyzed in this category.
7. Line 346, “AR Virtual Space Interaction, which encompassed three primary behavioral actions: Move, Scale, and Rotate, further categorized into Coordinate Axis Manipulation, Numerical Input, and Simple Manipulation for refined analysis.” Line 350, “behavioral observations were coded based on the frequency and duration of each identified behavior”. Please explain the relationship between “Move, Scale, Rotate”, “Axis Manipulation, Numerical Input, Simple Manipulation”, and “frequency, duration” and how to convert them.
8. Table 1, “M (%), SD (%)”, why are the mean and standard deviation expressed in percentages? According to Line 328, “The main task required participants to design …within a 15-minute timeframe”, why is the maximum value of Duration greater than 900 seconds?
9. Line 441, “The proportion…environments (SrealityS_{reality}Sreality) and AR environments (Saugmented realityS_{augmented\space reality}Saugmented reality) is presented in Figure 3”. It is unclear what these symbols mean.
10. The explanation of the research results needs to be more logical. The current content is not easy to read and understand.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

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Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript has been improved compared to the previous version. I have no further suggestions. 

Author Response

Thank you