Neat Redesign

A recent research by the Wichita Psychology University analyzed the influence of text-align and page layout (1, 2 and 3 columns) on visitors’ reading speed and comprehension.

For instance, the obvious results were that two-column full-justified text is read with almost the same speed than one-column left-justified text but a lot faster than one-column full-justified text and other two and three column variants.

Another piece of results is that full-aligned text and single-column text was easier to comprehend than other variants.

Quote:

	Columns
	One	Two	Three
Full Justification	4.64 (0.92)	4.25 (0.90)	3.99 (1.01)
Left Justification	4.28 (1.17)	3.77 (0.95)	4.14 (1.08)

Yet another thing to note is the effect on fast and slow reading site visitors.

Basically, from the image we can see the following:
- one-column layout seems to be the best for either type, slow or fast readers
- three column layout is a bit faster than two column layout for both, too
- two column layout has greatly increased the reading speed for fast-reading people and has similar beneficial, albeit lesser, effect on slow-reading people
- one-column layout was read slower for left-aligned text

You can see other interesting data from the report, if you want.

What brings this to site designers and owners?

It adds another thing to consider when designing the site for the visitors.
Now we need to know whether people read fast or slow. How can this be determined?

Naturally, those who read a lot tend to read faster due to lots of practice. Who reads a lot? Educated and, consequently, smarter people. Due to reading, they are more likely to have more knowledge than those, who don’t read much (obviously).

This brings us to a theory that if you sell something technical or complex, your site readers will read fast and you’ll need to use two column full justified text.

If you sell something less technical, like grocery products or something, you’d rather go with one-column left-aligned text.

Another factor to consider is the correlation between gender and the speed of reading and intellectual level of the website visitor. Do women read less than men? Or more?

My guess is that they read more, but they read less technical stuff, like women magazines, etc. Of course, nowadays women tend to be more business-like, which somewhat removes the difference between genders for reading speed. However, I’d still make put one-column left-aligned text for the women, as another aspect to consider is a habit of reading two-column newspaper layout. And my guess (it’s only a guess) is that women read less newspapers than men. Shoot me a study or research on this, anyone?

Anyway, what is your take on the problem? Have you spotted anything else in the research?

Related posts:

• Neat Redesign’s two month’s digest
• Which column layout do I need?
• How site accessibility can improve business

This entry was posted on Monday, June 26th, 2006 at 6:06 pm and is filed under Design, Accessibility, Usability, Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.