Abstract

This study reports the descriptive and inferential statistical findings of a survey of academic reading format preferences and behaviors of 10,293 tertiary students worldwide. The study hypothesized that country-based differences in schooling systems, socioeconomic development, culture or other factors might have an influence on preferred formats, print or electronic, for academic reading, as well as the learning engagement behaviors of students. The main findings are that country of origin has little to no relationship with or effect on reading format preferences of university students, and that the broad majority of students worldwide prefer to read academic course materials in print. The majority of participants report better focus and retention of information presented in print formats, and more frequently prefer print for longer texts. Additional demographic and post-hoc analysis suggests that format preference has a small relationship with academic rank. The relationship between task demands, format preferences and reading comprehension are discussed. Additional outcomes and implications for the fields of education, psychology, computer science, information science and human-computer interaction are considered.

Acknowledgments

Tania Todorova¹, Pan Yantao², Jiuzhen Zhang³, Daniela Živkovic⁴, Darija Pešut⁴, Terttu Kortelainen⁵, Judit Bar-Ilan⁶, Noa Aharony⁶, Elena Collina⁷, Liga Krumina⁸, Hanady Geagea⁹, Silvia Ghinculov¹⁰, Ane Landøy¹¹, Almuth Gastinger¹², Aurora de la Vega¹³, Ana Lúcia Terra¹⁴, Nicole Johnston¹⁵, Angela Repanovici¹⁶, Polona Vilar¹⁷, René Schneider¹⁸, Güleda Dogan¹⁹, Serap Kurbanoglu¹⁹, Patricia Jamal²⁰, David Bawden²¹, Jane Secker²², Chris Morrison²³, A.M. Salaz²⁴, Diane Mizrachi²⁵*, and Joumana Boustany²⁶

¹University of Library Studies and Information Technology, Sofia, Bulgaria

²Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China

³Peking University, Beijing, China

⁴University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia

⁵Oulu University, Oulu, Finland

⁶Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel

⁷Università di Bologna, Bologna, Italy

⁸Latvijas Universitate, Riga, Latvia

⁹Lebanese University, Beirut, Lebanon

¹⁰Academy of Economic Studies, Chişinău, Moldova

¹¹Bergen University, Bergen, Norway

¹²Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway

¹³Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, Lima, Peru

¹⁴Instituto Politecnico do Porto, Porto, Portugal

¹⁵Edith Cowan University, Joondalup, Australia

¹⁶Transylvania University, Brașov, Romania

¹⁷University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia

¹⁸Haute Ecole de Gestion, Geneva, Switzerland

¹⁹Hacettepe University, Ankara, Turkey

²⁰Khalifa University, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

²¹City University, London, England

²²London School of Economics, London, England

²³Kent University, Canterbury, England

²⁴Carnegie Mellon University, Doha, Qatar

²⁵University of California, Los Angeles, USA

²⁶Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée, Paris, France