Application created by Jennifer Davies in support of the Landmarks research project at Athabasca University
The Landmarks project seeks to discover whether e-texts can be made more memorable by adding more or less subtle landmarks (such as non-repeating patterns, glyphs, margin decorations, etc) that provide visual (and, later, other media) anchors for the reader. Existing work in the field has shown that such landmarks can help readers to locate passages again, but this is (as far as we know) the first to attempt to discover whether it is easier to remember the contents of the text. Evidence that it might be effective comes from studies comparing electronic and paper texts, some of which suggest that paper texts tend to be more memorable due in part to things like page curvature, imperfections in the type or the paper, and other visual cues that utilize our native ability to recall aspects of our physical environments.
This application incorporates the PHP-PDS Skeleton guidelines documented here.