Using eye-tracking as a means to evaluate visual and content design choices in web 2.0 - An initial finding from Livemocha

In the evaluation of Web 2.0 language learning websites, various aspects to be evaluated are often distinguished, such as the visual design, the pedagogical content, and the involvement of multiple technologies (Liu et al., 2011). In order to make the evaluative judgments, the methods commonly used include expert judgment by inspection of the website, or user judgment obtained from surveys of learner attitude (Chwo, 2013). This study aims to add to this range of evaluation methods by exploiting a relatively new research tool, eyetracking (Reichle et. al, 2013), to help establish what options are in fact better. We took as an example the instructions presented on screen for various tasks and, based on the types given in the Livemocha website (Chwo et al., 2012), devised webpages allowing us to measure how four eye movement related effects differ with nine binary webpage choices ranging from visual design (e.g. dark or light background) to pedagogical content (e.g. presence or absence of a picture). Six Taiwanese learners of English major student participated. Results show that the titles, background colors and highlighted prints will increase our EFL (English as Foreign Language) learners' fixation frequency and the focal browsing time. However, the opposite result goes to the illustration relevant to the reading text. Moreover, the increasing number of the word count in the text will shorten the fixation frequency and focal browsing time. Lastly, the location of the illustration will not affect the browsing behaviors. The interpretation and the potential factors contributed to the findings will be discussed.