Low Spatial Proximity Between Text and Illustrations Improves Children’s Comprehension and Attention: An Eye Tracking Study
Loading...
Links to Files
Permanent Link
Author/Creator
Author/Creator ORCID
Date
2022
Type of Work
Department
Program
Citation of Original Publication
Boyd, M., Godwin, K. E, Gurchiek, E., Fisher, A., & Eng, C. M. (2022). Low Spatial Proximity Between Text and Illustrations Improves Children’s Comprehension and Attention: An Eye Tracking Study. Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, 44. Retrieved from https://escholarship.org/uc/item/7nk9q7wj
Rights
This item is likely protected under Title 17 of the U.S. Copyright Law. Unless on a Creative Commons license, for uses protected by Copyright Law, contact the copyright holder or the author.
Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
Subjects
Abstract
Learning to read is a critical skill; yet only a small portion of children in the United States are reading at or above grade level. Attention is one crucial process that affects the acquisition of reading skills. The process involves selectively choosing task relevant information and requires monitoring competing demands. Many books for beginning readers include illustrations, but this design choice may require learners to split their attention between multiple sources of information. This study employed eye tracking to examine whether embedding text within illustrations in children’s e-books inadvertently induces attentional competition. The results showed that spatially separating illustrations from the text in beginning reader books reduces attentional competition and improves children’s reading comprehension. This study shows that changes to the design of books for beginning readers can help promote literacy development in children.