Center of Multimedia Teaching and Learning, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher Weg 8, 06120 Halle, Germany.
Department of Psychology, Brandenburg Medical School, Neuruppin, Germany.
Acta Psychol (Amst). 2023 Mar;233:103836. doi: 10.1016/j.actpsy.2023.103836. Epub 2023 Jan 13.
Online reading is becoming more and more popular in learning and teaching environments. However, little is known about characteristics of hypertexts that influence on reading comprehension and attention. Some previous studies have suggested that attention failures also referred to as mind wandering (MW) occur whenever the available resources of the reader (e.g., working memory capacity; WMC) do not match the task demands (e.g., text difficulty). This study aims to investigate the effect of restructuring a linear text into different hypertext types by means of hyperlinks on MW in a cognitively demanding task like reading. We hypothesized that participants exposed to a difficult to read hypertext with networked structure engage more in task-unrelated thoughts (TUTs) compared to participants asked to read a difficult but hierarchically organized hypertext. 90 participants read either an easy or difficult version of the same unfamiliar hypertext with either a hierarchical or networked structure and with embedded thought probes. Reading comprehension and WMC measures followed. As expected, participants reading the difficult (to read) hypertext with networked link structure showed significantly more TUTs than participants reading the hierarchical link structure hypertext. In addition, readers with a low-WMC showed significantly more TUTs while reading a demanding hypertext regardless of its structure. These findings are in line with the view that mind wandering occurs if available resources do not match with task demands, and thus deepen assumptions about hyperlinks as new cohesive devices.
在线阅读在学习和教学环境中变得越来越流行。然而，对于影响阅读理解和注意力的超文本特征，我们知之甚少。一些先前的研究表明，只要读者的可用资源（例如工作记忆容量；WMC）与任务需求（例如文本难度）不匹配，就会发生注意力失败，也称为思维漫游（MW）。本研究旨在通过超链接将线性文本重构为不同的超文本类型，以此研究在阅读等认知要求高的任务中对 MW 的影响。我们假设，与阅读困难但层次化组织的超文本的参与者相比，暴露于具有网络结构的难以阅读的超文本的参与者会更多地参与与任务无关的想法（TUT）。90 名参与者阅读了具有层次结构或网络结构且嵌入思想探针的相同不熟悉超文本的简单或困难版本。随后进行阅读理解和 WMC 测量。正如预期的那样，与阅读具有层次链接结构的超文本的参与者相比，阅读具有网络链接结构的困难（难以阅读）超文本的参与者表现出明显更多的 TUT。此外，无论超文本的结构如何，具有低 WMC 的读者在阅读要求高的超文本时都会表现出明显更多的 TUT。这些发现与这样一种观点一致，即如果可用资源与任务需求不匹配，思维漫游就会发生，从而加深了关于超链接作为新的衔接手段的假设。
