Front page layout and reading paths : the influence of age on newspaper reading

Abstract

Portuguese newspapers, as many other European newspapers, are be- coming increasingly visual. Even in the so-called quality newspapers printed pages look less dense than they used to be, have less text, more pho- tos and colours and their front page layouts are organised according to the visual logic of the screen. In spite of this movement towards the visual, one of the features that it still is a sign of the difference between a quality paper and a popular one is the predominance of written text. However, the verbal element has been transformed into display, meaning that also language has become, largely, visual. These changes in newspapers layout are not mere formal changes. They imply new ways of combining the written text with visual components and new forms of semiotic organisation that influence the way newspapers are read and that contribute to create new kinds of readers. According to Kress and Van Leeuwen (1998), many newspapers layouts do not prescribe a clear sequence of reading or a reading path to their readers, and this relative openness of newspapers layout gives the reader the possi- bility of choosing a strategy of reading. Age is one of the factors that may explain this choice, as differences of age imply variations on reading prac- tices and habits, and therefore different dispositions towards the newspaper pages (Kress, 2003: 165). Those who have been trained by the screen may be disposed to read a relatively less open page – as the ones of quality newspa- pers, when compared to the tabloids’ – according to the principles of the visual logic; and the opposite might happen: those who have been socialised into the older forms of textual organisation have to deal with tabloid newspapers. In this paper my purpose is to test the hypotheses laid down by Kress and Van Leeuwen (1998) against readers’ actual interaction with newspapers front pages.