Time-on-task effects in digital reading are non-linear and moderated by persons' skills and tasks' demands

- Time on task effects in digital reading were positive in weak readers and hard tasks.
- Time on task effects in digital reading were null in strong readers and negative in easy tasks.
- Time on tasks effects in digital reading had a strong negatively u-shaped quadratic component.
- Results fit with a dual-processing account of digital reading.
- Results replicate across 19 educational systems from Europe, Asia, America, and Oceania.

Time-on-task effects on response accuracy in digital reading tasks were examined using PISA 2009 data (N = 34,062, 19 countries/economies). As a baseline, task responses were explained by time on task, tasks' easiness, and persons' digital reading skill (Model 1). Model 2 added a quadratic time-on-task effect, persons' comprehension skill and tasks' navigation demands as predictors. In each country, linear and quadratic time-on-task effects were moderated by person and task characteristics. Strongly positive linear time-on-task effects were found for persons being poor digital readers (Model 1) and poor comprehenders (Model 2), which decreased with increasing skill. Positive linear time-on-task effects were found for hard tasks (Model 1) and tasks high in navigation demands (Model 2). For easy tasks and tasks low in navigation demands, the time-on-task effects were negative, or close to zero, respectively. A negative quadratic component of the time-on-task effect was more pronounced for strong comprehenders, while the linear component was weaker. Correspondingly, for tasks high in navigation demands the negative quadratic component to the time-on-task effect was weaker, and the linear component was stronger. These results are in line with a dual-processing account of digital reading that distinguishes automatic reading components from resource-demanding regulation and navigation processes.