Fitzsimmons, Gemma (2020) The impact of skim reading and navigation when reading hyperlinks on the web, experimental data 2009-2018. UK Data Archive doi:10.5255/UKDA-SN-854153 [Dataset]
Abstract
It has been suggested that readers spend a great deal of time skim reading on the Web and that this type of reading can affect comprehension of text. Across 2 experiments, we utilised eye tracking methodology to explore how hyperlinks and navigating web pages affect reading behaviour. In Experiment 1, participants read static web pages either for comprehension or whilst skim reading, while in Experiment 2, participants additionally read through a navigable Web environment. Embedded target words were either hyperlinks or not and were either high-frequency or low-frequency words. Results from Experiment 1 showed readers only fully lexically process linked words when skim reading, as was evidenced by a frequency effect that was absent for the unlinked words. They did fully lexically process both linked and unlinked words when reading for comprehension. In Experiment 2, which allowed for navigating, readers only fully lexically processed linked words compared to unlinked words, regardless of whether they were skim reading or reading for comprehension. We suggest that readers engage in an efficient reading strategy where they attempt to minimise comprehension loss while maintaining a high reading speed. Readers use hyperlinks as markers to suggest important information and use them to navigate through the text in an efficient and effective way. The task of reading on the Web causes readers to engage with the text in a markedly different way from typical reading experiments.
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