Abstract
In this study, we examine Chinese-English bilinguals' performance at completing tasks on web sites with identical Chinese and English versions. Participants were required to perform two tasks with each web site, and the time necessary for completing the tasks was recorded. Despite participants' competency with English, tasks that were completed in Chinese were performed more quickly, and participants judged that they were easier. Crucially, this advantage for Chinese web sites was not simply due to a reduced fluency with English; when English comprehension ability was included as a covariate, performance on the Chinese web sites remained superior to the English sites. We argue that the choice of language for a web site should not simply be due to a threshold of competency among users, but instead should reflect users' preferences for their native language.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Usability evaluation and interface design : Cognitive engineering, intelligent agents and virtual reality. Vol. 1 of the Proceedings of HCI International 2001 |
| Editors | Michael J. SMITH, Gavriel SALVENDY, Don HARRIS, Richard J. KOUBEK |
| Place of Publication | Mahwah, N.J. |
| Publisher | Lawrence Erlbaum Associates |
| Pages | 1096-1099 |
| Number of pages | 4 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9780805836073 |
| Publication status | Published - 2001 |
| Externally published | Yes |