An eye-Tracking Study of College Students’ Infographic-Reading Processes

Abstract

We know little about how readers, especially readers with various characteristics, incorporate materials with highly synthesized words and graphs like infographics. We collected eye movements from 95 college students as they read infographics and categorized them into high-/low-score groups based on comprehension scores. Participants initially inspected the word areas that corresponded to the graph areas with the highest perceptual salience. The high-score group showed greater total fixation duration (TFD), TFD ratios of graphs, and transition numbers between words and graphs, indicating more processing of infographics. The low-score group showed greater TFD ratios of words and saccade amplitudes, indicating information-searching behavior.