The effect of font size on children's reading time, comprehension and meta-comprehension.

Numerious studies in cognitive psychology suggest that difficulties are often desirable for learning. There is, however, a recent controvery on whether presenting textual materials in difficult-to-read fonts is also desirable. Up to date, little research on this matter has been conducted with children. We examined the effect of smaller-than-standard fonts, that are more difficult to read, on children's reading comprehension, reading time, and metacomprehension judgments, and whether children's age moderates these effects. Second and fifth graders read four short age-appropriate texts presented either in a standard font size for that grade or in a smaller-than-standard font, they then judged their comprehension, and completed a comprehension test. Results revealed that small fonts enhanced fifth graders' comprehension, but impaired second graders' comprehension. Therefore, a small font is a desirable difficulty for fifth graders but an undesirable difficulty for second graders. Second graders had longer reading time when reading in standard (vs. smaller) font, but fifth graders' reading time was not affected by font size. Finally, fifth graders did not appreciate the benefits of a small font, and the small font improved metacomprehension accuracy. Theoretical and practical implications will be discussed.