Results
The relationship among objective reading measures collapsed across age are found in Table 12. Mean Reading Time and Mean Legibility were significantly related. No relation was found between Mean Reading Distance and either Mean Legibility, or Mean Reading Time. The relationship among objective reading measures for each age
Table 11: Significant chi2 Values for Pairwise Comparisons of Preference Ratings for all Participants (p<.0026)
Font
Univers Condensed
Garamond Condensed
The Sans
Century Old Style
Times New Roman Sans 10.67
Sabon 10.67
Bell Gothic 16.67
10.67
Times New Roman 13.50
13.50
10.67
16.67
Table 12: Overall Person Correlations Between Reading Measures Across Participants
n.s. = Not significant
Distance
Time
Ease
Discomfort
Clarity
Simplicity
Reading Time
0.0386 n.s.
Reading Ease
0.1956 n.s.
-0.1664 n.s.
Reading Discomfort
0.1143 n.s.
-0.2096 n.s.
0.9439 p<.05
Letter Clarity
0.0010 n.s.
-0.1283 n.s.
0.7171 p<.05
0.6667 p<.05
Font Simplicity
-0.3537 n.s.
-0.0235 n.s.
-0.3813 n.s.
-0.2659 n.s.
-0.0968 n.s.
Font Legibility
-0.0851 n.s.
0.4696 p<.05
-0.0422 n.s.
-0.0639 n.s.
-0.3731 n.s.
-0.2606 n.s.
group are found in Table 13. The relationship between Mean Reading Time and Mean Legibility only approached significance for both young and elderly participants. The relationship between Mean Legibility Threshold and Mean Reading Distance also approached, but did not reach, significance for young observers. None of the other relationships among the objective reading measures even approached significance.
Table 13: Person Correlations Between Reading Measures Across Participants for Young and Elderly Participants
Young Participants
Measures
Distance
Time
Ease
Discomfort
Clarity
Simplicity
Reading Time
-0.0757 n.s.
Reading Ease
0.0520 n.s.
0.1319 n.s.
Reading Discomfort
0.0262 n.s.
0.0767 n.s.
0.9342 p<.05
Letter Clarity
-0.4087 n.s.
0.4681 n.s.
0.6200 p<.05
0.5080 n.s.
Font Simplicity
-0.2448 n.s.
0.3696 n.s.
0.0913 n.s.
0.1683 n.s.
0.4681 n.s.
Font Legibility
-0.5113 n.s.
0.4187 n.s.
0.0910 n.s.
0.0965 n.s.
0.5027 n.s.
0.1181 n.s.
Elderly Participants
n.s. = Not significant
Measures
Distance
Time
Ease
Discomfort
Clarity
Simplicity
Reading Time
0.1803 n.s.
Reading Ease
0.3268 n.s.
-0.4001 n.s.
Reading Discomfort
0.2086 n.s.
-0.4792 n.s.
.9586 p<.05
Letter Clarity
0.3356 n.s.
-0.4954 n.s.
.7799 p<.05
.7767 p<.05
Font Simplicity
-0.5178 n.s.
-0.1854 n.s.
-.7030 p<.05
-.6250 p<.05
-0.5620 n.s.
Font Legibility
-0.0277 n.s.
0.5352 n.s.
-0.0725 n.s.
-0.1033 n.s.
-0.4930 n.s.
-0.0466 n.s.
The relationship among subjective reading measures collapsed across age are found in Table 12. A significant overall relationship was seen between Mean Reading Ease and Mean Reading Discomfort, Mean Reading Ease and Clarity of Type, and Mean Reading Discomfort and Clarity of Type. No significant relationship occurred between Mean Simplicity/Complexity and the other subjective reading measures. The relationship among objective reading measures for each age group are found in Table 13. For young participants, there was a significant relationship between Mean Reading Ease and Mean Reading Discomfort, Mean Reading Ease and Mean Clarity of Type. The relationship between Mean Reading Discomfort and Mean Clarity of Type approached, but did not reach, significance. As for the data across age groups, no significant relationship was seen between Mean Simplicity and the other subjective measures among the young participants. For elderly participants, significant relationships were seen between Mean Reading Ease and Mean Reading Discomfort, Mean Reading Ease and Clarity of Type, and Mean Reading Discomfort and Clarity of Type. Mean simplicity/complexity was also correlated with both Mean Reading Ease and Mean Reading Discomfort. Mean Simplicity/Complexity approached, but did not manifest a significant relationship with Mean Clarity of Type.
There were no significant overall correlations between any objective and subjective reading measure across age, nor were any observed within either age group (see Table 12 and 13).
The preference measure was based on a forced distribution in which observers ranked their preference for the eight fonts on a one-to-eight scale. Mean Font Preference Rankings were obtained by averaging the preference rank for each font across all participants and rank ordered the results. To facilitate analysis of the relationships between preference and the other reading measures, they were also transformed into scales for each font using the same approach. The relationships among the various reading measures were then examined using Spearman correlations. As can be seen in Table 14, Reading Ease, Reading Discomfort and Clarity of Type were all significantly related. Reading Discomfort was also related to Legibility. Reading Distance was inversely related to Reading Ease, Reading Discomfort, Clarity of Type and Preference. Preference was related to Reading Ease, Reading Discomfort, and Clarity of Type. No other relationships with Preference were significant.
Table 14: Overall Spearman Correlations Between Ranked Reading Measures Across Fonts
n.s. = Not significant
Measures
Distance
Time
Ease
Discomfort
Clarity
Simplicity
Legibility
Reading Time
-0.120 n.s.
Reading Ease
-0.651 p<.05
0.276 n.s.
Reading Discomfort
-0.767 p<.05
0.143 n.s.
0.719 p<.05
Letter Clarity
-0.755 p<.05
0.191 n.s.
0.826 p<.05
0.905 p<.05
Font Simplicity
-0.386 n.s.
0.024 n.s.
0.380 n.s.
0.156 n.s.
0.515 n.s.
Font Legibility
-0.479 n.s.
0.095 n.s.
0.287 n.s.
0.714 p<.05
0.571 n.s.
0.156 n.s.
Font Preference
-0.633 p<.05
0.204 n.s.
0.765 p<.05
0.898 p<.05
0.826 p<.05
-0.018 n.s.
0.419 n.s.
The overall Spearman correlational analysis of the relationships among the font rankings on the various reading measures, as repeated for the young and elderly age-groups separately (see Table 15). The pattern of significant relationships among the reading measures as well as the number of reading measures that were significantly related to one another, differed between the elderly and young groups (19 vs. 14 respectively). Possible age differences in these relationships were evaluated using R-to-Z transformations (Glass & Hopkins, 1984), which are shown in Table 16. This revealed an age-related difference between Reading Time and Reading Distance, Reading Ease, Reading Discomfort, Letter Clarity, Simplicity, and Preference. There was also an age difference between Simplicity and Reading Ease, Reading Discomfort, and Clarity of Type.
Table 15: Spearman Correlations Between Ranked Reading Measures Across Fonts for Young and Elderly Participants
Young Participants
Measures
Distance
Time
Ease
Discomfort
Clarity
Simplicity
Legibility
Reading Time
0.8095 p<.05
Reading Ease
-0.527 n.s.
-0.4671 n.s.
Reading Discomfort
-0.7857 p<.05
-0.691 p<.05
0.7306 p<.05
Letter Clarity
-0.7952 p<.05
-0.711 p<.05
0.7273 p<.05
0.9639 p<.05
Font Simplicity
-0.2381 n.s.
-0.381 n.s.
-0.3234 n.s.
0.1905 n.s.
0.1325 n.s.
Font Legibility
-0.5988 n.s.
-0.5389 n.s.
0.5904 n.s.
0.8024 p<.05
0.703 p<.05
0.1557 n.s.
Font Preference
-0.8539 p<.05
-0.903 p<.05
0.5768 n.s.
0.8295 p<.05
0.889 p<.05
0.1464 n.s.
0.5768 n.s.
Elderly Participants
n.s. = Not significant
Measures
Distance
Time
Ease
Discomfort
Clarity
Simplicity
Legibility
Reading Time
-0.5238 n.s.
Reading Ease
-0.8144 p<.05
0.7665 p<.05
Reading Discomfort
-0.7075 p<.05
0.6587 p<.05
0.8836 p<.05
Letter Clarity
-0.6946 p<.05
0.6467 p<.05
0.9277 p<.05
0.8836 p<.05
Font Simplicity
-0.7857 p<.05
0.6667 p<.05
0.9341 p<.05
0.8783 p<.05
0.8503 p<.05
Font Legibility
-0.1078 n.s.
0.3114 n.s.
0.3133 n.s.
0.5522 n.s.
0.3675 n.s.
0.5389 n.s.
Font Preference
-0.619 n.s.
0.9286 p<.05
0.7785 p<.05
0.7319 p<.05
0.7186 p<.05
0.7381 p<.05
0.3713 n.s.
Table 16: R-to-Z Transformations on Age-Related Differences in the Relationships between Reading Measures collapsed Across Font
* = Significant at p<.05
Young
Elderly
Difference
Relationships
R
R
Z
Reading Time/ Reading Distance 0.810
*
-0.524
2.699
* Reading Time/ Reading Ease -0.467
0.767
*
2.400
* Reading Time/ Discomfort -0.691
*
0.659
*
2.594
* Reading Time/ Letter Clarity -0.711
*
0.647
*
2.623
* Reading Time/ Simplicity -0.381
0.667
*
1.907
* Reading Time/ Preference -0.903
*
0.929
*
4.959
* Reading Time/ Legibility -0.539
0.311
1.138
Simplicity/ Reading Ease -0.323
0.934
*
3.202
* Simplicity/ Discomfort 0.191
0.878
*
1.859
* Simplicity/ Clarity 0.133
0.850
*
1.777
* Simplicity/ Reading Distance -0.238
-0.786
*
1.292
Simplicity/ Preference 0.146
0.738
*
1.263
Clarity/ Legibility 0.703
*
0.368
0.771