Immersive or Not: Exploring the Moderating Role of Cognitive Style on Learning Outcomes in Virtual Reality Engineering Education

ABSTRACT Immersive Virtual Reality (IVR) creates a highly immersive learning environment for learners. Exploring learning behavior patterns and effectiveness across various information processing modes in IVR experiments helps understand how IVR affects learning effectiveness. This paper focuses on VR experiments in the field of mechanical engineering from the perspective of cognitive style. By comparing the performance of learners with different cognitive styles in both immersive and non‐immersive VR experiments, covariance analysis, moderation effect analysis, and lagged sequence analysis are used to analyze learners' knowledge retention and skill transfer abilities, learning behavior patterns, and explore the moderating effect of cognitive style. The study found that: (1) Compared to non‐immersive virtual experiments, IVR experiments are more effective in enhancing the abilities of knowledge retention and skill transfer. (2) Cognitive styles moderate the impact of IVR experiments on learning effectiveness. (3) Field‐independent learners exhibited more operational behaviors, enhancing their visual experience and information processing in the IVR environment, which significantly improved their learning outcomes. In contrast, field‐dependent learners displayed more auxiliary behaviors, which affected their sense of presence, suppressed their positive emotions, and consequently inhibited the improvement of their learning effectiveness. These findings highlight the moderating effect of cognitive style on learning outcomes in IVR experiments, and provide insights for educators to design learner‐centered activities and establish personalized learning paths to meet diverse needs.