Reporting on a study in International Journal of Innovation and Learning, Ars sums up the findings with: "The problem. . . is that PowerPoint made its way into the classroom well in advance of our understanding of how best to use it." Animation, even when used in an effort to focus attention rather than to call attention to themselves, can inhibit learning. Not a stop-the-presses find, but good for quantitative data on the topic of the deadening effect of bad PowerPoint. See the full article.