The F-Shaped Pattern and Reading Online Content Eye tracking visualizations, as reported in the interesting study by Jakob Nielsen F-Shaped Pattern For Reading Web Content – The F-Shaped Pattern For Reading Web Content, suggest that users often read online pages following a pattern in the shape of the letter F: first, a fast horizontal movement is performed in the upper part of the content, with which the first words or sentences of the text are read, then a second fast but shorter horizontal movement is performed, positioned lower down on the page, with which words generally placed at the beginning of the sentence are assimilated again, then a final scan is performed with a vertical movement on the left side of the page: this is a slower scan than the two previous movements, represented as a continuous strip in some cases, a third horizontal scan is also performed, making the final letter look more like an E than an F.
Other times, only one movement is performed, creating thailand number data an upside-down L. What clearly emerges from Nielsen's study is that the majority of web readers do not read word by word, but perform a rapid photographic scan, during which they more easily absorb the content placed in strategic points of the page and organized with the use of visual guides, such as bold or bulleted lists. with online content In addition to the F-scan, there are other types of movements tracked with eye tracking , as reported in this article on Creative Handles : spotted pattern : those who read with a "speckled" mode focus only on specific elements located in various points of the page .
These readers are particularly helped by the presence of bold text, bulleted and numbered lists, heading tags and other visual guides. precedence over the heading : other types of users favor titles and headings to immediately evaluate whether the paragraph is interesting. If they consider the topic relevant, they proceed with reading, otherwise they abandon the page: for this very reason, it is important to place keywords that attract the eye in the headings and not write headings longer than 60-80 characters.