Computers & Education 153 (2020) 103900

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Comparing reading comprehension between children reading

augmented reality and print storybooks
Delneshin Danaei a, *, Hamid R. Jamali b, Yazdan Mansourian b,
Hassan Rastegarpour c
a
School of Information Studies, Kharazmi University, No.43, South Mofatteh Ave., Tehran, Iran
b
School of Information Studies, Charles Sturt University, NSW, 2678, Australia
c
Educational Technology, Kharazmi University, No.43, South Mofatteh Ave., Tehran, Iran

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Reading in early ages can be a challenge due to difficulties in recognizing new words and may
Augmented reality result in lack of proper comprehension of the text. To address this problem, technology has been
Augmented storybook used in the form of electronic books and more recently Augmented Reality (AR) books. In this
Children’s books
study, we measure reading comprehension of children reading an AR storybook and compare it
Reading comprehension
with their counterparts reading the traditional print version of the same book. Reading
comprehension was tested in this study by measuring children’s ability in retelling and recalling
of the story. A quasi-experimental methodology was employed with post-test only design. The
participants were 34 children aged 7 to 9 in Tehran (Iran) which were randomly assigned to
either experimental or control group and read the print storybook with and without a tablet.
Participants were asked to retell the story and answer comprehension questions right after
reading the storybook. Children were observed during storytelling and interviewed. Mann-
Whitney test was used for data analysis. The results showed a significant difference between
the control and the experimental groups in terms of overall reading comprehension. Children who
experienced augmented storybook were better in retelling and answering comprehension ques­
tions. However, this was not the case in all subcategories, as there was no significant difference
between the groups in retelling theme and setting. Also, the experimental group scored higher in
answering implicit questions. Overall, the presentation of related multimedia content with the
print storybook will result in improvement in reading comprehension. Possible explanation and
implications are discussed.

1. Introduction

Reading is the first and probably the most important skill being learned in first years at schools. It is a complex process defined by
International Literacy Association as “The process of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and
involvement with written language” (“Literacy Glossary, International Literacy Association,” n.d.). Reading is believed to have
tremendous impact on children’s life in terms of learning, cognitive development, academic achievements, promotion of critical

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: delneshin@[Link] (D. Danaei), [Link]@[Link], hjamali@[Link] (H.R. Jamali), ymansourian@[Link]
(Y. Mansourian), h_rast1@[Link] (H. Rastegarpour).

[Link]
Received 11 October 2019; Received in revised form 19 March 2020; Accepted 11 April 2020
Available online 15 April 2020
0360-1315/© 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
D. Danaei et al. Computers & Education 153 (2020) 103900

thinking and problem solving skills (Kao, Tsai, Liu, & Yang, 2016). Therefore, children are encouraged to read from the early ages to
enrich their literacy skills, expand their vocabulary acquisition and be able to read alone. Story and picture books are supposed to be
very useful in improving literacy, motivating children to read and supporting cognition components such as thinking, explaining,
understanding and remembering (M. Chen & Ferdig, 2003). Therefore, improving reading instructions and literacy skills have been a
major concern among literacy practitioners and educational researchers.
However, reading in early ages could be a challenge due to difficulties in recognizing new words and may result in lack of proper
comprehension of the story and reluctancy to read. To reduce such problems, different digital mediums such as electronic storybooks
(Ertem, 2011; Kao et al., 2016; Lauricella, Barr, & Calvert, 2014), interactive storybooks (Zipke, 2017) and multimedia story appli­
cation (N. Zhou & Yadav, 2017) have been suggested and evaluated. While such books are designed to facilitate reading by adding
multimedia content and there is a great tendency toward technology nowadays; still some believe that reading from the screen is
shallow and associated with poor comprehension (C.-M. Chen & Chen, 2014), the information is absorbed more rapidly and more
accurately from paper reading than from e-books (Stanica et al., 2019) and e-books have even been viewed as a failure by some book
publishers (A. Flood, 2018). Also, studies showed that most children prefer traditional print books over digital (Ahmadi, Maktabifard,
& Momeni, 2015; Strouse & Ganea, 2017). That might be because of the better feelings associated with the reading a print book, like
ease in holding, paging, using and touching a paper over digital screen.
Therefore, as an initiative to combine print and digital books, the augmented reality (AR) books have been emerged. In such books,
the print book stays the same while the multimedia content can be viewed by holding a digital device over the book pages. Augmented
books have drawn the attention of both researchers and educators as a means to enhance books with interactive visualization and
simulation, animation, 3D graphics and sound (Duenser & Hornecker, 2007a) and are expected to bring about less disruptive reading
experience (Grasset, Dünser, & Billinghurst, 2008), provide a better perception of complex content (Duenser & Hornecker, 2007b),
support leaners with different reading abilities (Duenser, 2008) and finally enhance reading comprehension of early readers.
Although quite a large number of studies (Chang & Hwang, 2018; Chen, Chou, & Huang, 2016; Chien, Su, Wu, & Huang, 2017;
Cihak et al., 2016; Efstathiou, Kyza, & Georgiou, 2018; Gan et al., 2018; Georgiou & Kyza, 2018; Hsu, 2017; Joo-Nagata, Martinez
Abad, García-Bermejo Giner, & García-Pen ~ alvo, 2017; Karagozlu, 2018; Lee, Chen, Wang, & Chung, 2018; Lorenzo, Go �mez-Puerta,
Arr�aez-Vera, & Lorenzo-Lled� o, 2018; Sirakaya & Çakmak, 2017; Wang, 2017; Wu, Hwang, Yang, & Chen, 2018; Yilmaz, 2016; Yoon,
Anderson, Park, Elinich, & Lin, 2018) have focused on the effectiveness of AR in educational context, a smaller number of studies have
considered AR storybooks (Cheng & Tsai, 2014; Clark & Dunser, 2012, pp. 7–10; Duenser & Hornecker, 2007a; Eiksund, 2012; Grasset
et al., 2008; Ha, Lee, & Woo, 2010; Hornecker & Dünser, 2007) and among which only a few studies evaluated the influence of AR
storybooks on reading comprehension of children (Duenser, 2008; Tobar-Mun ~ oz, Baldiris, & Fabregat, 2017).
In this study we make an evaluation of the influence of AR storybook on children’s reading comprehension. To gain a better
understanding of the purpose and significance of the current study, a review of the literature on reading comprehension and evaluation
methods in previous studies as well as AR technology and AR books is presented.

2. Review of the literature

2.1. Augmented reality books

AR is defined as a 3D technology that promotes an individual’s perception and understanding of the real-world surroundings by
overlaying virtual objects onto the real world (Leung & Blauw, 2020). Three requirements have to be fulfilled by AR applications:
combine the real and virtual, be interactive in real-time and align real and virtual objects together (Azuma et al., 2001). By using a
mobile device’s camera, AR superimposes a virtual layer in the form of text, video, audio and other forms of imagery (Cooper, 2011),
on top of the live image, let the user interact with both layers while remaining immersed in the new world (Seibert-Johnston, 2014).
AR has been used in educational settings and publication industry due its potential for instructional usage.
The book being augmented with digital content is called an ‘augmented book’ and was first proposed with the MagicBook (Hor­
necker & Dünser, 2007). In augmented book, the digital content is represented in different formats such as audio, video and 2D or 3D
animation and can be experienced using a PC, head-mounted display, smart phone or tablet. Production of augmented book has been
more prevailing for children because of the educational and entertaining features.
In storybooks, AR is utilized as a medium to enhance immersiveness by mostly using feature animated characters and virtual pop-
ups (Kljun et al., 2019). Some examples are virtual pop-up books (Taketa, Hayashi, Kato, & Noshida, 2007), that is aimed to promote
reader’s understanding and liveliness of the print book; the mixed-reality book (Grasset et al., 2008) which was designed to explore the
notion of reader immersion and engagement; a comic book named Modern Polaxis which use augmentation to reveal the character’s
secret and conspiracies (Stanica et al., 2019), Digilog (Ha et al., 2010) which is equipped by multisensory AR content to give a better
image of South Korea cultural heritage, and Little Red (Saso, Iguchi, & Inakage, 2003) which is taking interactivity more seriously by
letting reader change the story and ending by his actions. Beside research and experiments, AR storybook absorbed the attention of
some children books publishers as well. Carlton books published King of the Railways and Books and Magic developed The Little
Mermaid, both combined the print book with AR games.
There are a number of advantages for reading an AR storybook mentioned in previous research. AR storybooks provide a more
interactive space for storytelling by encouraging the use of touch in the exploration of the story contents (Z. Zhou, Cheok, Pan, & Li,
2004). They are exciting, engaging, playful and enjoyable; they also facilitate recall of the story, expand the ability to empathize and
encourage active reading (Clark & Dunser, 2012, pp. 7–10; Duenser & Hornecker, 2007a; Gil, Rhim, Ha, Doh, & Woo, 2014; Grasset
et al., 2008; Kauppinen, Luojus, Tuomisto, & Ahlgren, 2013). The interactive feature of AR storybooks may also motivate enthusiasm

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toward reading (Robb, 2010) which in turn can enhance reading comprehension.

2.2. Reading comprehension

Reading comprehension is a key skill for all readers. It is an active process of relating prior knowledge and experiences to new
knowledge derived from the text to build meaning (Doty, Popplewell, & Byers, 2001; Kao et al., 2016). Improving reading compre­
hension and inference from academic and non-academic text is one important need for students, which prepares them for better
thinking and living. Therefore, teachers and educators are constantly trying to evaluate and promote children’s reading
comprehension.
Reading comprehension is an internal hence invisible process and researchers are studying about its components and different ways
to improve it. Ertem (2009) indicates four important components of comprehension: word level process, prior knowledge, motivation
and attitude, and reader strategies. Each component can be strengthened using different techniques, for example adding illustration
and animations to the text can support vocabulary understanding, and using technology may enhance motivation toward reading.
Flood and Lapp (1978) suggested three levels of literal, inferential and critical comprehension which explains levels of comprehension
from recognizing the text meaning to being able to infer and even criticize information to obtain new insight.
One subfield of reading comprehension is story comprehension. There are different criterion tests of story comprehension, two
common techniques of retelling and recalling are more popular among researchers (Doty et al., 2001; Ertem, 2009; Matthew, 1997;
Morrow, 1985). In this method, the reader will be asked to retell the story right after reading it, and to answer implicit and explicit
questions. Leslie (1993) believes that retelling and answering comprehension questions should be used together, as they measure
different things. Matthew (1997) confirms that “process measures, such as open-ended questions and story retelling, provide insight
into the students’ interactions with the text, by which personal meaning and inferences are created”. Also, Doty et al. (2001) admit that
retelling shows the reader’s understanding of the story structure, while the answers to implicit and explicit questions reveal reader’s
comprehension of the story content based on their prior knowledge and their inferences (Ertem, 2009). So, we will use retelling
measure to estimate the reader’s understanding of the story’s structure and then propose recall questions to find out the extent to
which each reader grasped the meaning of the story.
It has been argued that adding multimedia content such as audio, video and interactivity to the text will enrich the learning
experience because the message is conveyed in various forms and can be received by different channels (auditory, visual and haptic)
(Billinghurst & Duenser, 2012; Yuen, Yaoyuneyong, & Johnson, 2011). Previously, studies have examined the difference between
comprehension of children reading text storybook and electronic storybooks. Some of them revealed a better comprehension with the
electronic books (Ertem, 2009; Kao et al., 2016; Matthew, 1997), some found no difference between two groups (N. Zhou & Yadav,
2017; Zipke, 2017), and a study found a difference in recalling but not in retelling the story between two groups of readers (Doty et al.,
2001).
The studies regarding reading comprehension when AR is involved are not abundant and they mostly have evaluated other aspects
of reading while engaging with AR books, such as reading instructions, word recognition and reading strategies (Ramli & Badioze
Zaman, 2009), reading behaviors between children and their parents (Cheng & Tsai, 2016) and cognitive load, motivation and attitude
toward reading (Cheng, 2017). Tobar-Mun ~ oz et al. (2017) focused on reading comprehension in an AR game-based learning envi­
ronment. Their study is relevant to our study as they used recall questions (literal, inferential and opinion) to assess reading
comprehension, but it differs from our study as we employ retell factors as well. Another related study (Duenser, 2008) used retell and
recall measures to realize AR ability to support low ability readers. He scored the retell performance by the number of events being
retold; however, we use retelling to measure the extent to which children understand the story structure. Besides, the study of Duenser
(2008) compares two groups of avid and low ability readers, while we compare AR and traditional book readers with almost the same
reading abilities. Overall, our research is different from previous research of reading AR books in terms of objectives, measures and
methodology.

2.3. The current study

In the present study we investigate the effects of AR storybook on early reader’s comprehension of the story. We consider both
retelling and recalling of the story to figure out about the children’s understanding of the structure and content of the story. This
research addresses the following questions:

1. What is the difference in story comprehension between the children reading the AR storybook and children reading the print
storybook?
2. What is the difference in understanding the story’s structure between the children reading the AR storybook and children reading
the print storybook?
3. What is the difference in answering explicit and implicit story questions between the children reading the AR storybook and
children reading the print storybook?

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3. Methodology

3.1. Participants

The subjects were 34 children aged 7 to 9 (n ¼ 34; 7 years old ¼ 19, 8 years old ¼ 9, 9 years old ¼ 6) from five children libraries in
Tehran that were randomly assigned to two groups of experimental (n ¼ 18; 11 girls and 7 boys) and control (n ¼ 16; 9 girls and 7
boys). In Iran, children are instructed to read and write from 7, so our sample included children who could read independently by
themselves. We selected libraries over schools to ensure our participants are good readers of storybooks. Also, for having a homo­
geneous sample in terms of reading abilities, we asked the librarians to invite only avid readers to participate. The children libraries
were selected from different parts of Tehran to maximize the diversity in the sample. For the selection process, the librarians, based on
their knowledge of the children who used the library frequently, invited children to take part in our research. From the pool of the
nominated participants that were invited by the librarians, we randomly selected and assigned 34 children to the two experiment and
control groups. All participants had the experience of working with digital devices with 85% owned a tablet even for themselves or the
family and only 4% owning a smartphone. The digital devices were mostly used for playing games (88%), watching movies (20%),
using messaging apps (17%) and taking photos (17%). The respondents were good readers, with more than half of them reading at least
2 books in the past week. Informed consent was obtained from the parents of the participants before the experiment.

3.2. The AR storybook

Children literature facilitators and instructors were consulted to select the right book for this study. Our priority was to have a high-
quality storybook, with high level pictures and an attractive story to hold the readers till the end. After all, Maurice Sendak’s “Where
the Wild Things Are” was selected for this research. It is a well-known classic children storybook which brought its author/illustrator
Caldecott medal and Hans Christian Andersen prize. In a survey by School Library Journal, it was selected as number one among a list
of top 100 picture books. There was also an animated version of the book on YouTube using the book’s own images, which we used for
developing the AR book.
The story is about a young boy named Max engaging in mischief at home, called by her mother as “wild thing” and sent to bed
without supper. He starts dreaming of the land of wild things where he is a king. Together with the wild things they run riot until he
misses his mother and goes back to his room, finding his hot supper waiting for him.
To augment the book we used animations based on real images of the book, other 2D animations to augment the front pages, proper
music based on the story atmosphere, sound effects like ocean, animals, doors closing and such sounds and oral reading of an expert
storyteller. So, the reader can hold a tablet on pages to see and hear the augmentation and when a sign of “flip” appears, s/he can flip
the print book to the next page (Fig. 1). We used HP Reveal Studio for AR development, it is free and needs no computer and coding
knowledge to work with.

3.3. Measures

3.3.1. Retelling
Morrow’s (1985) 10-point scale was employed to score the retelling. It measures the reader’s ability to retell the story in a
structured way. According to this measure, the story structure is composed of setting, theme, plot episodes, resolution and sequence,
and a maximum overall retelling score of 10 points can be received by respondents. To verify the reliability of the scale we used
Cronbach’s alpha and got 0.84 indicating that reliability was satisfactory. Morrow (1986) himself reported that the mean correlation
between 6 evaluators who scored the same 12 story retelling independently was .90 for total retelling scores. This indicates high
reliability for using this measure.

Fig. 1. The AR storybook screenshots, a. augmenting with 2D animation, the flip sign appears when the video finishes in each page, b. augmenting
with 2D animation, the video dimensions grows with the jungle growth and the 2D animation appears on the front page.

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3.3.2. Recalling
To assess the reader’s recall of the story, six questions were designed, three implicit and three explicit questions as suggested by
Leslie (1993). The answer to explicit questions can be found directly from the text or pictures of the book, while answering implicit
questions requires inference from prior knowledge and cues in the book. We also took morrow’s (1985) classification of questions into
recall of details and cause-and-effects relationships for explicit questions and feelings and problem solving for implicit questions. We
used open-ended questions as recommended by Zhou and Yadav (2017), which encourages children to put in cognitive effort and
engage in deep level processing. Also, upon consultation with children’s literature trainer and facilitators, we posed broader and less
direct questions to limit the possibility of dictating the answers to respondents and increase the chance of understanding the reader’s
comprehension of the story. The recall questions were as follow:

Explicit questions In which direction did the boy ride the boat? Right or left? recall of details
What are they doing here? (Showing the wild rumpus picture) recall of details
What happened here? (Showing the page where the boy is back home) cause-and-effect relationship
Implicit questions How do you think the boy is feeling here? (Showing the page where the jungle grows in the room) interpretation of feelings
What is the boy’s feeling here? (Showing the first encounter with wild things) interpretation of feelings
Why the supper was still hot? problem solving

3.4. Procedures

This study had a quasi-experimental with post-test only design. Each participant in the experiment and control groups read the
book individually (Fig. 2). Members of the experiment group were first introduced to AR book and how to use it. Then they all asked to
retell the story in their own words like they are telling someone who has never read the book. We helped children who had difficulty in
the beginning and continuing the story by encouraging phrases proposed by Morrow (1985) as directions for guiding retellings. The
oral retellings were recorded and then scored by two researchers using Morrow’s 10-point scale. After the retelling, children were
asked to answer the comprehension questions. We told them that there are no right or wrong answers to the questions and it is not an
examination, so they could more freely think and engage in answering. Finally, each participant got a score (0–10) for retelling, one
(0–6) for recalling and a total for overall comprehension (see Fig. 3).

3.5. Data analysis

To find the difference between the two groups of data, Mann-Whitney U test was used. The Mann–Whitney U test is a nonparametric
test which is used to compare two independent samples when data are either interval scale but assumptions for t-test (normality) are
not satisfied, or ordinal (ranked) scale (McCrum-Gardner, 2008). So, it was selected because we had ordinal data and two independent
groups of experiment and control. The test was employed for retell, recall and comprehension scores, also for each subcategories of
story structure and explicit and implicit questions to detect significant differences. Where the difference was significant, the effect size
was also calculated to find the extent to which the comprehension was influenced by the means of reading. The effect size reveals the
magnitude of effect where the difference between variables is significant. We used eta-squared which classifies the effect sizes as small
(0.02), moderate (0.13) and large (0.26).

4. Results

The results showed a significant difference between the children’s scores in two groups in terms of retelling, recalling and overall
comprehension (Table 1). The higher mean rank of comprehension of the experiment group shows that the reading comprehension was
higher in the group reading the book with AR and with a confidence level of 95% this difference can be seen between two groups in the
research population. The mean rank for retelling and recalling was also higher in AR book readers (Table 2). Also, the eta square was
16%, 12% and 13% for comprehension, retelling and recalling components respectively, which shows medium effect size of using the

Fig. 2. Children are experiencing the AR storybook.

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Fig. 3. Experiment procedure flowchart.

Table 1
Mann-Whitney U test results for retelling, recalling and comprehension.
Retelling Recalling Comprehension (Retelling þ Recalling)

Mann-Whitney U 86.000 84.500 78.000

Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) .043 .036 .022
Eta square .124 .134 .159

Table 2
Mean rank and median for retelling, recalling and comprehension.
Groups N Mean Rank Median

Retelling AR book 18 20.72 8

Traditional Book 16 13.88 6
Recalling AR book 18 20.81 4
Traditional Book 16 13.78 3
Comprehension AR book 18 21.17 12
Traditional Book 16 13.38 8

AR tool.
To be more specific, we conducted the Mann-Whitney test for subcategories of retelling and recalling. The results showed that the
difference between two research groups in three components of pointing out plot episodes, resolution and sequences of the story was
significant and according to higher mean ranks of experiment group, children using the AR storybook scored better in this regard.
Similarly, answering to implicit questions was significantly different between AR and traditional readers, where the AR book readers
outperformed the traditional readers considering their mean ranks. On the other hand, in two subcategories of setting and theme, as
well as answering explicit questions, the difference between control and experiment group was not significant. Also, the effect size for
plot episodes, resolution, sequences and implicit questions was 22%, 13%, 12% and 13% respectively (Table 3).

Table 3
Mann-Whitney U test Results for retelling and recalling subcategories.
Retelling Recalling

Setting Theme Plot episodes Resolution Sequences Explicit Implicit

Mann-Whitney U 125.000 136.000 78.000 88.000 91.000 105.000 87.000

Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) .555 .750 .007 .039 .045 .149 .038
Eta square – – .222 .129 .122 – .130
Mean Rank Experiment 18.56 17.06 21.17 20.61 20.44 19.67 20.67
Control 16.31 18.00 13.38 14.00 14.19 15.06 13.94

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According to aforementioned information we can answer research questions.

Answer to question 1: Children reading the AR storybook performed better than the children reading the print storybook in story
comprehension.
Answer to question 2: Children reading the AR storybook scored higher in retelling the story and so had a better understanding of
the story structure. However difference in retelling setting and theme was not significant between two groups.
Answer to question 3: Children reading the AR storybook scored higher in answering the implicit questions, however there was no
difference in answering the explicit questions between the AR and print storybook readers.

5. Discussion

The purpose of the current study was to investigate the influence of AR storybook on reading comprehension of early readers. The
study provided evidence that AR storybook can improve children’s story comprehension. Children exposed to AR storybook scored
better in retelling and recalling tests, however, not all subcategories revealed a significant difference. The participant’s scores in
retelling setting and theme and answering explicit questions were not significantly different in the AR and print conditions.
Our findings are in line with previous studies (Altun, 2018; Ertem, 2009; Ihmeideh, 2014; Kao et al., 2016) which found multimedia
content fosters story comprehension. It is also partially consistent with studies which indicated the significant difference between print
and e-book reading only in retelling (Matthew, 1997) or recalling (Doty et al., 2001; Korat, 2010; Roque, Teodoro, Cunanan, &
Evangelista, 2017). On the contrary, this study diverges from previous research (N. Zhou & Yadav, 2017; Zipke, 2017) which revealed
no significant difference between children using e-books and print books. However, it should be noted that we studied AR books which
are different from e-books in letting the reader interact with both print and digital book at the same time. The similarity between our
research and cited ones is that the readers had access to multimedia content while reading. So, the comparison should only be
interpreted considering this difference. When comparing to previous AR book studies, our results differ from Tobar-Mun ~ oz et al. (2017)
study which found no difference in recalling literal and inferential questions when reading AR and non-AR book. That could be due to
using a game in their study which is more complex and calls for more cognitive load in the experimental group.
One possible explanation for the better comprehension of the experiment group is the less decoding effort they endured in compare
to print book readers. Some technological features may facilitate the exchange of information between the reader and the text and
therefore help in better comprehension (Doty et al., 2001). We used read-aloud of the text in the AR storybook as a facilitator. When
early readers engage in reading a book, they may encounter unknown words and put a lot of mental effort for encoding. Therefore, they
will be more focused on reading the story correctly and may miss the meaning. The oral reading feature of the AR book aids to free up
the readers’ mental engagement for decoding so they can better absorb the meaning.
Another presumed reason why children better comprehended the story with the AR book is the animations in AR storybook.
Visualizing and animating the story details will support the sense-making by non-verbal representation and raises the visual
comprehension. Some researchers (Kao et al., 2016) note that cognitive load reduces when a large amount of printed text comes with
multimedia content, which in turn increases the comprehension of the story. Our findings represented a better performance of the
experiment group in answering implicit questions. These questions were mainly based on visual comprehension, so probably the
animation could better exhibit the implicit concepts of the story and support visual comprehension.
Other reasons can be suggested for better understanding of implicit concepts by the experiment group. The implicit questions are
measuring the child’s conception of feelings and thoughts of the characters and understanding of the main idea and message of the
story. The AR storybook readers scored higher in identifying the character’s feelings, maybe because they were more immersed in the
story. The AR book features such as the narrators’ tone of voice, music and sound effects, which can demonstrate feelings and mood,
can attract the readers’ attention and take them into the story; maybe even boost their imagination as if they are the main character of
the story. Also, animations can better show the characters’ facial expressions and manners than the static images. In a study taken by
Takacs and Bus (2016), the children who were exposed to an animated book, better comprehended the story than those watching the
static images, therefore they concluded that “motion attracts visual attention and changes the way children process illustrations”, “it
also seems to scaffold learning by guiding children’s visual attention”.
Moreover, implicit questions place a greater demand on inferential thinking and prediction (Altun, 2018) and reveal a greater level
of comprehension of the respondent as children move beyond simple recall of details to a profound understanding of
goal-action-outcome sequences (Richter & Courage, 2017). The children who answered implicit questions exhibited the ability to
relate new information to their prior knowledge and make inference. Our findings showed that AR group outscored their counterparts
in answering implicit questions, one explanation is that when the information is received from different channels such as auditory and
visual, it more efficiently is learned and retained than when it is processed in a single channel (Bus, Takacs, & Kegel, 2015). It can also
be related to reduced cognitive load when reading an AR book, which frees up the mental space and let the reader think deeper and
comprehend more broadly.
One of the research findings was the lack of difference between two groups in retelling setting and theme of the story, unlike the
other structure components. It means that AR may help in remembering more episodes, retelling the story in a sequence manner and
finish with a conclusion, but it may not influence on pointing to the characters and theme of the story. When the children are asked to
retell the story with their own words, they indicate only the parts they consider more important. Children in both groups could not
point to the characters or the main problem of the main character; maybe because they did not find it important at all.
In addition to the above remarks, some AR aspects might have influenced the reading comprehension. One aspect is the immersion
reader experience while reading with AR mediation, in which the reader’s concentration might increase and so does the

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comprehension. Also, the multisensory and various media formats used in our AR application might have acted as a stimulus to
improve understanding and learning. Furthermore, by adding live animations and sound effects as complementary content, our
readers were probably more interested, active and enthusiastic about reading and in turn grasped the meaning better.
The results of the current research showed a better story comprehension with the AR tool mediation. However, it should be noted
that adding the multimedia content to the book will not necessarily raise reading comprehension as stated by Kao et al. (2016). The
added content needs to be consistent with the story. The multimedia content which is only decorative and is not connected to the
storyline, might play as a seductive and irrelevant items that distract children from the story by increasing the cognitive load and
interrupting information processing, so they may interfere with learning and do not add to the children’s story comprehension (C.-C.
Chang, Lei, & Tseng, 2011; Takacs & Bus, 2016; Takacs, Swart, & Bus, 2015). The design of the AR book must also be according to
instructional principles (Kao et al., 2016) and usability features to bring a pleasant user experience for the readers.

6. Conclusion

We carried out an experiment to investigate reading comprehension in an AR environment and compared two groups of children
reading AR and print version of a storybook. Retell and recall measures were employed to obtain early reader’s scores in each group.
Using a quantitative approach, we concluded that the application of AR content has a positive influence on reading comprehension of
early readers. Our analysis showed a significant difference in retelling, recalling and overall comprehension between the two groups.
Therefore, we suggest AR storybook as an instructional aiding tool that supports children’s literacy learning. However, it is very
important that the digital content be consistent with the storyline and add value to the text and illustrations.
This study’s novelty in the field of reading comprehension in multimedia environments lies in the using AR book as the subject
instead of e-books. It was also one of the few studies in the AR field that studied storybooks not educational books. Besides, we focused
on retelling and recalling as reading comprehension components. By using retelling we let the readers to freely describe what they
remembered and then evaluated their ability to explain the story in a structured manner. By using recalling we assessed their literal
and inferential comprehension through asking explicit and implicit questions. Therefore, our study was innovative for using both
methods of retelling and recalling to measure reading comprehension in AR storybooks, unlike other studies in AR storybooks which
were based on only recalling (Tobar-Mun ~ oz et al., 2017) or involved retelling and recalling but considered only recall of events in both
cases (Duenser, 2008). Our study contributes both to the reading comprehension and AR storybook bodies of research. It calls for new
research by reading comprehension experts to consider AR books in their studies and to compare it with e-books. It also encourages the
AR book researchers to pay attention to the effectiveness of AR tools in promoting reading. The results of the current study can be used
by teachers, experts in children reading and literature and other stakeholders to study, develop and use technology to promote the
reading abilities of early readers.
Future research can provide more knowledge on how deeply children can understand the meaning while reading AR storybook and
what design principles should be used for developing efficient AR storybooks. Also, researching reading comprehension in AR books
when more interactive options or 3D images are involved can yield more insight into understanding the role of different augmentation
content in learning.

6.1. Study limitations

This study had some limitations, so the findings should be interpreted with cautious. The first limitation is the limited number of
respondents in this study that should be regarded for the generalization of the results. We tried to restrict the influence of the
intervening variables by choosing a familiar and silent setting for the experiment, however some factors such as the presence of
librarian and researcher might have affected the respondent’s concentration. The story chosen for this study was a complicated
fantasy, maybe a realistic story provide different results. Also, our measures compelled us to transform qualitative data into quanti­
tative. Although two researchers checked and revised the datasets, the process of transformation may have disrupted the reliability.
Although we tried to have a homogeneous sample by selecting only avid readers as participants, we did not use a pre-test to evaluate
the participants’ reading skills and therefore, the individuals’ ability to read might have affected the result.

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Delneshin Danaei: Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis, Data curation, Software, Writing - original draft. Hamid R.
Jamali: Methodology, Supervision, Writing - review & editing. Yazdan Mansourian: Methodology, Writing - review & editing.
Hassan Rastegarpour: Methodology, Writing - review & editing.

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