The eye caught in the Net: A study on attention and motivation in virtual environment exploration

In virtual environment exploration, the user's gaze must be attracted by important features and information, but capturing user attention is not a straightforward task for designers. The dynamics of attention have been generally thought to be affected either by factors in the external environment, or by internal, motivational factors. The interaction between these two types of factor guides the user's exploration and hence should be taken into consideration in web design. Two experiments were carried out to explore the role of internal and external factors in controlling attention processes in a website task. The results suggested that the dynamics of attention are strongly influenced by internal motivation in this context. It was concluded that individual motivation plays a crucial and often predominant role in controlling attention when participants are engaged in activities using the internet.