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- Title
Press, swipe and read: Do interactive features facilitate engagement and learning with e‐Books?
- Authors
Xu, Ying; Yau, Joanna C.; Reich, Stephanie M.
- Abstract
Young children are introduced to mobile technology at an early age, with many using touchscreens daily. One appeal of touchscreen technology is that it seems to be intuitive for very young children. As a result, many children's e‐books are designed for tablets rather than for e‐readers or computers. E‐books often contain hotspots—interactive areas children can press to receive immediate auditory or visual feedback. This study assessed whether children's (N = 76, aged 3–5 years) interactions with hotspots increased their engagement with reading when using an e‐book independently and how such interactions were related to their learning from the story. Our results suggested that interacting with hotspots enhanced children's emotional engagement and sustained visual attention but not verbal engagement. Interacting with hotspots also benefited children's recall of story elements relevant to the hotspot but not their overall comprehension of the story. These findings inform the design and use of touchscreen media in early childhood. Lay Description: What is already known about this topic: Interactive features, such as hotspots on which children can press to receive visual or auditory effects, are commonly incorporated in children's electronic books.Hotspots may stimulate children's engagement and help children understand the content of the story; hotspots may also increase the demand of working memory, thus resulting in children's cognitive overload.These interactive features may increase or decrease children's engagement with and comprehension of the story depending on how children use them. What this paper adds: The present study explored the association of hotspots interaction with children's engagement with and learning from tablet‐based electronic books.Interaction with hotspots enhanced children's emotional engagement and visual attention as children used an e‐book, but not verbal engagement.Hotspot interactions benefited children's recall of story elements relevant to the hotspot but did not appear to enhance their holistic comprehension of the story. Implications of study findings for practitioners: Integrating hotspots that are congruent with the story into electronic books can offer young readers a more enjoyable and focused digital reading experience.Prompts or instructions should be given to guide children in their hotspot interactions.Designers may also want to consider incorporating hotspots that may facilitate children's verbal engagement with reading and story comprehension.
- Subjects
CALIFORNIA; AUDIOVISUAL materials; CHILD behavior; COMPUTER input-output equipment; ELECTRONIC books; INTERNET; LEARNING; QUESTIONNAIRES; READING; STATISTICAL sampling; USER interfaces; VIDEO recording; MULTIPLE regression analysis
- Publication
Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 2021, Vol 37, Issue 1, p212
- ISSN
0266-4909
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/jcal.12480