Is a hypertext a book or a space? The impact of different introductory metaphors on hypertext construction

This study examines the impact of different metaphors on the process of hypertext construction. Two groups of 20 college students with no experience in hypertext construction received introductory explanations on the text format “hypertext” based on either a book or a space metaphor. Then they had to construct hypertexts by linking prepared nodes on the topic of the “Internet”. The different metaphors had significant effects on the constructed hypertexts, the construction process, and knowledge acquisition. The book metaphor encouraged a more linear way of viewing hypertexts that conflicted with the complexity of the contents to be processed. The space metaphor permitted a correspondence between complex semantic structures and complex hypertext structures. Hence, the space metaphor seems to be more appropriate for explaining the text format hypertext to students.