Experimental Study on Mobile Device Screen Design Based on the User Reading Distance

This paper explores the impacts of the mobile device screen sizes during user's reading. In study, participants were asked to read text at length of 415 Chinese characters on mobile device screens (iphone, ipad, ipad mini) and fill the questionnaires to answer the questions about the reading experience. The behaviors of participants during reading process were recorded and the reading distances as well as their experience were analyzed. It was found that there is not a definite linear relation between reading distances and screen sizes of mobile devices. Reading distances of iphone are shorter than that of ipad and ipad mini, but there is no clear consequence between ipad and ipad mini. The participants in study of questionnaires chose ipad mini for its moderate parameters compared with iphone and iPad.