Focusing Effects from Online and Offline Reading Tasks

Abstract

Readers focus on aspects of texts that are important or informative for their reading experiences. What is considered important emerges as a function of instructional tasks, reader goals, and the nature of the text content. To date, studies of reader focus have examined what readers pay attention to during reading (i.e., online), and how that impacts what is remembered after reading is completed (i.e., offline). Many of these studies have obtained convergences between online and offline tasks, showing that what readers pay attention to maps directly onto what they are likely to remember later. However, some studies have also shown divergences between online and offline tasks. In the current chapter, we discuss how the particular methodologies employed in online and offline tasks encourage different profiles of reader attention, which might influence whether convergences or divergences are obtained. By documenting the effects of these methodologies, in terms of what readers deem relevant or not, models of text processing can better detail the causes and consequences of attention on reading comprehension.

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