Studies at the Poynter Institute, Stanford University use eyetracking equipment to track and record the way online readers’ eyes scan news websites. They analyse the way people pause on areas of the screen in order to absorb information. Their study has found that surfers first focus first, ignoring photos and graphics totally, returning to them after reading the text.

Steve Outing and Laura Ruel report the most common eye-movement patterns discovered What We Saw When We Looked Through Their Eyes . Their diagrams reveal on screen zones that are more important than others.

Other key elements in website design such as font size, navigation, page length are explored in this report. An interesting finding is that a smaller type face encouraged focused reading. Larger type face on the other hand promoted scanning. Short paragraphs are looked at for greater periods than longer paragraphs. The report suggests that “longer paragraph format seems to discourage viewing.” Also a one column format was viewed more. This study also found more eye fixations and longer viewing with right-column navigation than left.