Examining the Impact of Web Advertising on Reading： An Eye Tracking Study

This study measures visual attention to examine the impact of banner ads on reading and information processing on the Web. Using a 2 × 3 experimental design, 120 students were randomly assigned to read a series of either short or long articles on webpages presented with no banner ads, a static banner ad, or an animated banner ad. Visual attention was recorded by an eye-tracking device. Results from our study show that when there is too little information presented on a Webpage with no banner ads, the readers might become less attentive to the paper, while a long paper presented with too many visual stimuli may overload viewers’ cognitive capacity. While these findings are generally consistent with past research that compared the impact of static ads against animated ads, the addition of a control condition and the varying of article length in our study extended previous research by revealing more complex visual processing and cognitive processes.

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