Perceived Legibility of Onscreen English Fonts: An Exploration into Readers and Font Types

Onscreen English fonts have a critical role in communicating information. Although there has been research into the legibility of these fonts, no study has yet explored font legibility in the context of ethnicity across font types. The present study attempts to fill this void. 402 Thai and non-Thai participants completed questionnaires that displayed texts using serif, sans serif and script fonts. The analysis revealed that Thai and non-Thai readers’ perception of font legibility are similar. Comparing between the two ethnicities, the differences in perceived legibility of the serif and script fonts are statistically significant however the difference when compared to the sans serif was not significant. In addition, Thai readers perceived significantly different degrees of legibility among the three fonts. Yet, non-Thai readers perceived legibility of the serif and the sans serif fonts to be about the same but significantly different from the script font. In addition to extending theoretical insights into digital typography across two groups of viewers, practitioners could adopt the findings and use the onscreen English fonts that enhance viewers’ legibility