User's Preference of Web Page Length

180 International Journal of Research and Reviews in Computer Science (IJRRCS)

Vol. 2, No. 1, March 2011

User’s Preference of Web Page Length Paulus Insap Santosa1 1

Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jalan Grafika No. 2, Kampus UGM, Bulaksumur, Yogyakarta, Indonesia

Abstract: One factor that affects the comfort of person reading information presented in a Web site is the length of the information displayed on a Web page. Bad influence caused by a lengthy Web page is that users feel lost in a 'jungle of information'. This research was conducted to determine the user’s preference on the length of web pages. Three metaphors were used in this study to display information on web pages and how to access it: paper roll, window, and textbook. The research method employed in this research was experiment followed by post experiment survey. Respondents who voluntarily participated in this study amounted to 326 persons. The number of responses that was used in the final data analysis was 311, while 15 others were declared invalid because they were incomplete. Of the five hypotheses, four of them were, and the rest was not, supported by the collected data. Keywords: page length, paper roll, window, textbook, scrolling.

1. Introduction Various studies to determine the factors that influence the success of a Web have been done. One key success factor is consistency of a Web design [1], [2]. Ozok and Zalvendy [1] identified seven factors that affect the consistency of a Web design, one of which was the way the information was presented. The study involved 140 respondents and consisted of 4 experiments, each experiment containing 4 and 8 tasks of different types of interfaces. Data obtained from this study were analyzed using factor analysis. Measurement instrument that was used in this research was quite good with its internal reliability was 0.81 and inter-rater reliability was 0.75. One of the problems in designing a Web site, especially those associated with the presentation of very long information, is the absence of a benchmark about the length of a web page. Theoretically, the length of a Web page could be unlimited. However, if the user has to scroll the screen up or down often, the level of user’s comfort may decrease. Kim and Albers [3] stated that scrolling activities affects speed and execution time to perform certain task. In some cases, user has to scroll quite often. The smaller the size of the screen the more often scrolling activity must be done [4]. For example, Byrne et al. [5] found out that 13% of user’s time was spent to do the scrolling. So far, there is no clear guideline on what is the maximum length of a Web page should be. Dibbern and Dibbern (http://www.dibbern.com/build-a-website/web-page-definition-length.htm) suggested that the length of a website pages should be less than 3 times the maximum length (height) of the screen. In the absence of a clear guideline for the maximum length of a Web page, this study tried to shed light on the user’s preference of Web page length and whether certain preference affects user’s attitude and perceived ease of navigation

2. Literature Review and Hypotheses Several studies have compared information presentation, namely paging and scrolling, and its effect on the user’s speed in accomplishing the given tasks. Bernard et al. [6] conducted a study to find the best way to display the text search results from search engines. This study employed 18 volunteers who used a Web for 7-14 hours/week. They were asked to look for specific link on a result page of search engines presented with different layouts. Each layout has different search domain and displays a number of different links on each page. Three different layouts featuring a total of 100 links with the following arrangement: layout 1 showing 10 links per page (thus total of 10 web pages were used), layout 2 showing 50 links per page (in 2 Web pages), and layout 3 showing the 100 links in one Web page. The results of this study indicate that the layout that displays 50 links is the most preferred layout, and layout that shows the first 100 links were the least preferred layout, because it is more difficult to search specific information. The study concluded that paging was preferable than scrolling. Peytchev et al. [7] demonstrated similar result. In their research, Peytchev et al. asked respondents, 21.000 people in total, to fill out a survey consisting of 268 questions divided into 5 different topics. Respondents do not have to answer all questions as they could skip some of the questions. The result showed that the paging took a bit faster than scrolling. Baker [8] demonstrated different finding. Baker uses a similar setting with those of [6], i.e. using 3 different layouts for displaying a short story: ‘paging’ was used to display the short story in the four Web pages, ‘full’ was used to display the story in 2 separate Web pages without scrolling, and ‘scrolling’ was used to display the same story in a single Web page. The three different types of layout were tested on 15 respondents who were given the task to understand the given story. The results showed that respondents who use paging required a longer time to read and understand the contents of the story. The objects of the above studies were information that was presented in Web sites. Several other studies that were based on PDA have also been conducted, e.g. [3], [9], and [10]. In [3], to understand user behavior on scrolling, Kim and Albers employed different text length, i.e. 100-, 225-, 300-, 650-, and 850-word length in one presentation. The text contained both alphabetic and numeric information in a typical report format. Specifically, Kim and Albers found out that overall accuracy was good and differences between display conditions were not significant. This finding suggests that scrolling did not affect user’s concentration during their information search activity.

181 International Journal of Research and Reviews in Computer Science (IJRRCS)

In the above studies, especially in [6] and [8], the term ‘paging’ and ‘scrolling’ were used to distinguish the length of information that must be displayed in a limited computer screen size. However, the definition of ‘paging’ and ‘scrolling’ in the above studies were not clear. In general they said that ‘paging’ is a way of displaying information that is divided into several sections. For example, in [6], ‘paging’ is used to display 100 links in 10 different pages. In this case, Bernard did not explain how users moved from one page to the next, nor mentioning whether users were able to move back and forth. It did not explain what if a page that contained 10 links was exceeding the capacity of the computer screen, either. A layout called ‘full-layout’ in [8] was also confusing. Baker uses the term ‘full-layout’ to display a story in 2 separate Web pages without scrolling. Unfortunately, the term 'without scrolling' was not explained explicitly. Compared to ‘paging’, the term ‘scrolling’ has clearer meaning. Implicitly, scrolling means that users have to 'roll' the screen up or down to see information that is not visible due to the limited screen size. User can scroll the screen by clicking the respective button. Another way to explain the different layouts used in the above studies is by using metaphor. A metaphor is an analogy between two objects or ideas, which is used to describe an object using another object (http://en.wikipedia. org/wiki/Metaphor). Metaphors are widely used in designing icons for graphical interface. Metaphoric interfaces rely on an intuitive user-created relationship when they see a visual symbol of an interface component with its function [11].. For example, the icon ‘trash can’ is used to ‘remove’ files from any folder is a metaphor of a garbage bin in the real world that is used to dispose anything not useful. Based on the definition of metaphor, information presentation on a computer screen can be categorized into 3 different metaphors. The first metaphor is ‘paper roll’. This metaphor is used to display all information in one go in which users are allowed users to view information in any position. On the computer screen, the ‘paper roll’ metaphor forces users to scroll up and down along the computer screen. The second metaphor is ‘window’ or ‘slider’. In this metaphor, the information is displayed into several windows. Unlike ‘paper roll’, in ‘window’ the amount of information that can be viewed by users is limited, i.e. depends on the size of the window. Furthermore, ‘window’ only allows users to read information sequentially, although they can move forward or backward freely. The third metaphor is ‘textbook’ (textbook), which is a combination of ‘paper roll’ and ‘window’ metaphor. With ‘textbook’, users can view information displayed in a window randomly, i.e. user can move to any window. By looking at how information is presented within three different metaphor and how users can access information from its corresponding metaphor, the following hypothesis are stated: H1. Different users have different preferences on Web page length H2. Users who are using different metaphors have different attitude toward Web design H3. Users who are using different metaphors perceive

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search benefit differently H4. Users who are using different metaphors perceive search cost differently H5. Users who are using different metaphors perceive ease of navigation differently

3. Research Method 3.1 The Experiment The experiment requires participants to perform certain online activity. In detail, the experiment went on as follows: • Participants who were willing to get involved in this experiment were divided into three groups according to the three layout of the Web sites used in this experiment. To facilitate the provision of instruction, and for all respondents to receive the same instruction, respondents at each session only worked on one of three layouts. • The task given to all groups includes reading of an introductory text about web programming using the XAMPP package. After they have read the text, they were given a task to locate a word in the given text, and answer where the word is located within the given text. This activity is called with a word search. • Once participants completed the word search task, he/she continued with the next task, i.e. sentence search. In this task, participant he/she was required to find certain sentence within the given text. • The last task was for all participants to complete the postexperiment survey to get their feedback on the experiment they had just done. The number of words and sentences that need to be sought by the respondent for their word search and sentence search is 5 pieces, respectively. To facilitate the recording of search time for word and sentence tasks, a routine to record the respective time needed by participants to complete the two tasks was implemented. The timer was stopped when participants finished certain task, and it was started again when they continued with the next task. The timer was used only during the word and sentence search task. 3.2 Experiment Object The text used for both the word search and sentence search was the same. In the web page, the text and the questions were presented side by side for easy handling. Figure 1 and Figure 2 present the page for word search, and sentence search respectively. The text was written in Indonesian language.

Figure 1. The ‘word search’ page.

182 International Journal of Research and Reviews in Computer Science (IJRRCS)

To prevent respondents from skipping any question in both the ‘word search’ and ‘sentence search’, a Javascript routine is used to do the checking. Once respondents completed both searches, they were presented with online survey (see Figure 3), which was also equipped with Javascript routine to check the completeness of respondents’ answers.

Figure 2. The ‘sentence search’ page.

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4.3 Descriptive Statistics Before conducting hypotheses test, it is necessary to test the reliability of questionnaires and normality of the collected data. Questionnaires reliability test is used to test the reliability of the questionnaire to show the consistency of the questionnaires. The reliability score is obtained by calculating the value of Cronbach's Alpha. According to [12], a minimum value of Cronbach's Alpha is 0.7. Cronbach's Alpha value of less than 0.7 indicates that the questionnaires are not reliable. Table 2 shows that the questionnaires used in this study met the specified minimum value. Normality test is used to determine whether data obtained from respondents follow normal distribution. The normality of data can be observed from the calculation of skewness and kurtosis. George and Mallery [13] states that if abs(skewness) ≤ 1, and abs(kurtosis) ≤ 1, then the data is considered to follow normal distribution. Table 2 shows that the score of skewness and kurtosis of the data met the criteria set by [13], i.e. data follow normal distribution. Table 3 shows descriptive statistics of the above five variables. Group 1, Group 2, and Group 3, presents respondents who were using ‘paper-roll’, ‘window’, and ‘text book’ metaphor, respectively. Table 2. Result of questionnaires reliability and data normality test. Variable

Figure 3. Online survey page.

4. Data Analysis 4.1 Respondents Respondents for this research were students from different institutions. They participated voluntarily after a call for participation was broadcasted. The number of respondents participated in this research is 326. Due to some reason, only 311 collected data were used for further analysis. Table 1 shows ratio between male and female respondents. Table 1. Ratio between male and female respondents.

Cronbach’s Alpha

Skewness

Kurtosis

Web page length

0.726

-0.471

0.331

Attitude

0.781

-0.699

0.894

Benefit

0.797

-0.494

0.147

Cost

0.906

0.190

0.727

Ease of Navigation

0.810

-0.778

0.699

Table 3. Descriptive statistics. Variable

Group

# Respondents

Mean

Standard Deviation

Web page length

1

104

3.54

0.659

Sex

# Respondent

Percentage

2

102

3.49

0.656

Male

179

58%

3

105

3.62

0.692

Female

134

42%

Total

311

3.55

0.670

1

104

3.85

0.694

2

102

3.85

0.640

3

105

3.64

0.694

Total

311

3.78

0.682

1

104

3.48

1.037

2

102

3.38

0.618

3

105

3.86

0.661

311

3.58

0.820

Attitude

4.2 Survey Questionnaires It is mentioned that after respondents completed both the ‘word search’ and ‘sentence search’ task, they had to complete online survey as well. In specific, respondents were asked about their preference on Web page length, attitude, perceived benefit, perceived cost, and perceived ease of navigation. Each variable was measured using 4-item questionnaires measured by using 5-point Likert scale from ‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly agree’. The complete questionnaires are presented at the Appendix (the original questionnaires is presented in Indonesian language).

Benefit

Total

(Table 3 is to be continued in the next page)

183 International Journal of Research and Reviews in Computer Science (IJRRCS)

Vol. 2, No. 1, March 2011

Table 3. Descriptive statistics (continuation).

Table 4.b. Mean test for user attitude.

1

104

2.64

0.840

Group

F score

Significant

2

102

2.65

0.827

All group

3.278

0.039

3

105

3.44

1.043

Pair of Groups

t score

Sig. (2-tailed)

Total

311

2.91

0.981

1 vs. 2

-0.047

0.963

1

104

3.64

0.617

1 vs. 3

2.141

0.033

2

102

3.52

0.580

2 vs. 3

2.261

0.025

3

105

3.27

0.834

Total

311

3.48

0.703

Cost

Ease of Navigation

4.4 Hypotheses Test Hypotheses test was conducted in 2 steps. The first step was to test all 3 different groups in one test, and the second test was to test a pair of groups separately. The first test was conducted using one-way Anova to obtain F score and its corresponding significant level. The second test was conducted using independent mean test to obtain t score and its corresponding significant level. The purpose for the second test is to see whether there is a mean different between two sets of data to be able to see a better picture of the differences. Table 4.a to Table 4.e presents result of each hypothesis test, respectively. Table 5 summarizes all the hypotheses test presented in Table 4.a to Table 4.e (see from each table a line with ‘All group’ label).

5. Discussion Web site design involves three aspects, namely content organization, visual organization, and navigation [2]. These three aspects are related to one another, although the design should begin with the content organization. Content organization, also called information architecture, determines the Web site content and how that content is organized in such away for easy, interesting, and non-confusing presentation. Visual organization deals with how information is presented on the screen to create wow factor for its users. In general, there are two ways of presenting long information to computer screen via Web site. The first is just to dump all information in one very long page, and the other is to divide the presentation into several pages that users can navigate those pages back and forth. To help users find certain information, navigation design plays important role in determining how easy or difficult users find information of interest. Table 4.a. Mean test for Web page length preference.

Table 4.c. Mean test for perceived benefit. Group

F score

Significant

All group

10.667

0.000

Pair of Groups

t score

Sig. (2-tailed)

1 vs. 2

0.826

0.410

1 vs. 3

-3.191

0.002

2 vs. 3

-5.413

0.000

Table 4.d. Mean test for perceived cost. Group

F score

Significant

All group

26.214

0.000

Pair of Groups

t score

Sig. (2-tailed)

1 vs. 2

-0.108

0.914

1 vs. 3

-6.073

0.000

2 vs. 3

-5.977

0.000

Table 4.e. Mean test for perceived ease of navigation. Group

F score

Significant

All group

8.097

0.000

Pair of Groups

t score

Sig. (2-tailed)

1 vs. 2

1.464

0.145

1 vs. 3

3.693

0.000

2 vs. 3

2.526

0.012

Table 5. Summary of hypotheses test (α = 0.05). Hypothesis

F

Significant

Result

H1

1.084

0.340

Not supported

H2

3.278

0.039

Supported

Sig. (2-tailed)

H3

10.667

0.000

Supported

0.606

0.545

H4

26.214

0.000

Supported

1 vs. 3

-0.862

0.390

H5

8.097

0.000

Supported

2 vs. 3

-1.452

0.148

Group

F score

Significant

All group

1.084

0.340

Pair of Groups

t score

1 vs. 2

184 International Journal of Research and Reviews in Computer Science (IJRRCS)

The first hypothesis, which states that ‘different users have different preferences on Web page length’, was not supported by data in all groups or between a pair of group. This finding is not consistent with the result provided by [6] which concluded that the paging is preferable to scrolling. In [6], the reading comprises 10 pages each of which contains 10 links, and the length of the reading was not mentioned. Links used in [6] could force users to go to certain part of information that may not be the primary target. This could lead to a phenomenon called disorientation [14]. In the current experiment, the reading consists of only 5 pages where every page contains no links, and the length of each page is approximately one to one and a half screen size (height). Furthermore, there us no link in every page used in the current experiment. This setting gave positive impact to users in which they stayed focus on the information presented to them. With no confusing links, the possibility of disorientation can be minimized. Hypothesis 2 to hypothesis 5 was all supported by data for all-group comparison. The collected data supported hypothesis 2 that ‘users who are using different metaphors have different attitude toward Web design.’ In particular, there exist attitude difference of users who used ‘paper roll’ metaphor vs. ‘text book’ metaphor and among users who used ‘window’ metaphor vs. ‘text book’ metaphor. On the other hand, there was no attitude difference from users who used ‘paper roll’ metaphor vs. ‘window’ metaphor (see Table 4.b). Different attitudes shown by the data, particularly in users who use the metaphor of ‘paper roll’ vs. ‘textbook’ and the ‘window’ vs. ‘text book’, means that different information presentations affect whether users had positive attitude toward the reading content presented for this study. According to [15], attitude is a predisposition to act in a positive or negative way toward some object based on accumulation of information about an object, person, situation or experiences. When users were shown with information presented in certain way, a predispotion to continue reading the readings would appear that users might really continue reading or leave it alone. The data showed that ‘text book’ metaphor was the metaphor that created the different attitude among different users. However, this could not be used to explain the most preferred metaphor. Technology Acceptance Model [16] stated that perceived ease use and perceived usefulness (PU) of a system, which in this case is the Web site used to display the topic of web programming, positively affect user attitudes. Once again, this study did not specifically mention about PEU and PU, but the data supported the claim made by Davis. The third hypothesis that said ‘users who are using different metaphors perceive search benefit differently’ was supported by the data. In particular, there exist differences in the perceived benefits of users who used ‘paper roll’ vs. ‘text book’ metaphors and among users who used ‘window’ vs. ‘text book’ metaphors. On the other hand, there was no difference in the perceived benefits of users who used ‘paper roll' vs. 'window' metaphors (see Table 4.c). In this study, perceived benefit is defined as the perceived benefits of users after reading a topic about web program introduction. Data obtained from the study indicated that there exist differences in the perceived benefits the users got from reading material about web programming introduction. This research did not

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specifically study which group of users get the most perceived benefit among the three groups of users. The fourth hypothesis that said ‘users who are using different metaphors perceive search benefit differently’ was supported by data. Specifically, there exist differences in the perceived cost of users who used ‘paper rolls’ vs. ‘text book’ metaphors and among users who used ‘window’ vs. ‘text book’ metaphors. On the other hand, there was no difference in the perceived cost of users who used ‘paper roll' vs. 'window' metaphors (see Table 4.d). In this study, the cost is defined as negative feelings felt by the user when reading information in a certain way. Data obtained from the results showed that there exist differences in the perceived costs borne by users when they read material about web programming introduction. This research did not specifically study which groups of users who must bear the greatest burden among the three user groups. The fifth hypothesis that said ‘users who are using different metaphors perceive ease of navigation differently’ was supported by data. In particular, there exist differences in the perceived ease of navigation of users who used ‘roll paper’ vs. ‘text book’ and among users who used ‘windows’ vs. ‘text book’. On the other hand, there was no difference in the perceived ease of navigation of users who use the metaphor of 'paper roll' versus ‘window’. The difference in ease of navigation of ‘roll paper’ versus ‘text book’ metaphors can be understood from the way the users navigate the information presented using these two metaphors. Reading information presented in ‘paper roll’ metaphor requires scroll ups and downs to get to the information of interest. In the 'text book' metaphor, users only need to turn pages of books to get to the intended information. This result supports that of [8], i.e. paging is preferable to scrolling. Users who read the information displayed by using the metaphor ‘window’ feel the difference in ease of navigation compared with those who use the metaphor ‘text book’. The differences lie in the possibility of convenience users who use the metaphor ‘text book’ to read the information in no particular order, while in the metaphor ‘window’ users can only read them in sequence, although the amount of information that is displayed is just as big. One limitation of this study related to the length of the text used in the experiment. The text used in this research was considered not too long that was only composed of 5 sections and each section comprises between 200-250 words. In fact, volume of text that was is only 1 KB is too little compared with the volume of text on the Internet in general. Another limitation is that the search text and the sentence is directed, which means that text and sentence to be searched is determined from beginning. In real world, word search may contain a lot of varieties.

6. Conclusion The conclusions that can be drawn from this research are: 1. There is no difference in user’s preference on web page length. 2. There is difference in attitude toward reading materials presented to users who are using different metaphors, especially among users who are using ‘paper rolls’ vs. ‘text book’ and those who are using ‘window’ vs. ‘text

185 International Journal of Research and Reviews in Computer Science (IJRRCS)

book ' metaphors. 3. There is difference in user perceiving benefits from reading material about web programming introduction, especially among users who are using ‘paper rolls’ vs. ‘text book’ and those who are using ‘window’ vs. ‘text book ' metaphors. 4. There is difference in user perceiving cost from reading material about web programming introduction, especially among users who are using ‘paper rolls’ vs. ‘text book’ and those who are using ‘window’ vs. ‘text book ' metaphors. 5. There is difference in user perceiving ease of navigation by users looking for information on the web that is designed to use different metaphors, especially among users who are using ‘paper rolls’ vs. ‘text book’ and those who are using ‘window’ vs. ‘text book ' metaphors. To have a better understanding toward user preference on Web page length, the future research needs to include much bigger volume of text as well as variety of task given to the respondents. It is also necessary to have different type of respondents involving lecturer, administrative staff, or groups other than students.

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Browsers,” Proceedings of UIST’02, October 27-30, 2002, Paris, France, 2002. [10] O. Buyukkokten, H. Garcia-Molina, and A. Paepche, “Accordion Summarization for End-Game Browsing on PDAs and Cellular Phones,” Proceedings of the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI'01, 2001. [11] P.I. Santosa, Interaksi Manusia dan Komputer, Penerbit Andi, Yogyakarta, 2009. [12] J.C. Nunnally, Psychometric theory, Second ed., New York: McGraw-Hill, 1978. [13] D. George and P. Mallery, SPPS for Windows Step by Step: A Simple Guide and Reference 11.0 Update, Fourth Edition, Pearson Education, Inc., 2003. [14] M. Otter and H. Johnson, “Lost in hyperspace: metrics and mental models,” Interacting with Computers, Vol. 13, pp. 140, 2000. [15] S. Littlejohn, Theories of Human Communication, California: Wadsworth Thomson Learning, 2002. [16] F.D. Davis (1989), “Perceived Usefulness, Perceived Ease of Use, and User Acceptance of Information Technology,” Management Information Systems Quarterly, Vol. 13, No. 2, September, pp. 319-340, 1989.

References [1] A.A. Ozok and G. Salvendy, “How Consistent is your web design,” Behaviour and Information Technology, Vol. 20, No. 6, pp. 433-447, 2001. [2] D.D. McCracken and R.J. Wolfe, User-Centered Website Development, A Human-Computer Interaction Approach, Pearson Education, Inc., 2004. [3] Kim, L., Albers, M.J. “Web design issues when searching for information in a small screen display.” Proc. SIGDOC ’01 (Santa Fe, October 2001), ACM Press, 193-200, 2001. [4] M. Jones, G. Marsden, N. Mohd-Nasir, K. Boone, and George Buchanan, “Improving Web interaction on small displays.,” World Wide Web 8 Conference; Toronto, Ontario. [Online. Available: http://www8.org/w8papers/1bmultimedia/improving/improving.html, acces-sed on Nov. 10th 2010], 1999. [5] M.D. Byrne, B.E. John, N.S. Wehrle, and D.C. Crow, “The tangled web we wove: A taskonomy of WWW use,” Proceedings ACM Computer-Human Interaction Conference; Pittsburgh, PA. (May 15-20, 1999), pp. 544-551, 1999.

Appendix Variable Web page length

Attitude

Perceived benefit

Perceived cost

[6] M. Bernard, R. Baker, and M. Fernandez, “Paging and Scrolling: Looking for the Best Way to Present Search Result,” Usability News, Vol. 4, No. 1, 2002. [7] A. Peytchev, M.P. Coupe, S.E. McCabe, and S.D. Crawford, “Web Survey Design Paging Versus Scrolling,” Public Opinion Quarterly, Vol. 70, No. 4, Winter 2006, pp. 596–607, 2006. [8] R. Baker, “The Impact of Paging and Scrolling on Reading the Online Text Passages,” Usability News, Vol. 5, No. 1, 2003. [9] J.O. Wobbrock, J. Forlizzi, S.E. Hudson, B.A. Myers, “WebThumb: Interaction Techniques for Small-Screen

Perceived ease of navigation

Questionnaire Item Web page length is just right Web page length is suitable Web page length is what I want Web page length is appropriate Reading the text is positive Reading the text is important Reading the text is good Reading the text is one thing that I like Reading content increases my experience about the presented topic Reading content increases my knowledge about the presented topic Reading content increases my understanding about the presented topic Reading content increases my motivation to learn more about the presented topic Reading the presented text is just wasting time Reading the presented text make me confused. Reading the presented text adding my cognitive load Reading the presented text make me dizzy. The navigation is easy The navigation is simple The navigation is straight forward The navigation is fun