PONE-D-25-08059Impact of Web Accessibility on Cognitive Engagement in Individuals Without Disabilities: Evidence from a Psychophysiological StudyPLOS ONE

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Reviewers' comments:

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Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Thank you for the opportunity to read and comment on the paper, Impact of Web Accessibility on Cognitive Engagement in Individuals Without Disabilities: Evidence from a Psychophysiological Study. This study examines how web accessibility features designed for individuals with low vision and cognitive impairments can benefit all users. Using eye-tracking and heart rate variability measures, researchers analyzed the effects of these features on visual attention and cognitive processing in 20 participants without disabilities as they read news websites. The results indicate that cognitive engagement typically declines over time but can be maintained with cognitive accessibility enhancements. Additionally, low vision accessibility features improve readability. Both self-reports and psychophysiological data confirm the advantages of incorporating these features, highlighting their broader implications for inclusive web design.

Overall, I found the paper to be very well written, organized and structured in a clear manner with a logical flow. I appreciate the level of detail the authors provide in their hypotheses, methodological rigor, and statistical analysis plan. Their descriptions demonstrate rigor and transparency in their methods and analyses. I particularly found the analyses and results from the dynamics of visual attention to be a strong contribution from the study, as well as the mixed-methods and multimodal approach.

I only have some minor comments for the authors.

1. I have concerns regarding statistical power. I would like to see some explanation for how the sample size was chosen (e.g. a priori), and ideally, a power analysis. I found this lack of explanation surprising considering the level of statistical rigor in the rest of the text (it is not until the limitations section that the sample size is discussed).

2. It is briefly addressed in the limitations section, but I have some questions and would like further explanation from the authors regarding the sample consisting of non-native English speakers being examined on English text, and their statement: “we have no reason to suspect that the effects of accessibility features would have a different impact on native speakers”. I can think of several reasons why one might expect some different effects:

a. Studies have shown the use of subtitles, for example, differentially effects measures of realism, transportation, identification with characters, and other factors depending on if the subtitles are in ones own native language (e.g. Kruger, J. L., Doherty, S., & Soto-Sanfiel, M. T. (2017)

b. There are claims that second language reading is an interactive process, involving the interrelationship of cultural schemata and discourse structure – this could potentially have an impact on several of the measures included in this paper (see Barnitz)

c. There are even some specific findings on interpreting news media in non-native English speakers (Ward 2018), showing small but possibly relevant differences

The role that accessibility features might play in the above examples remains an open question – but I would like the authors to address this possibility or least better explain why they “have no reason to suspect” different impacts based on native language

Reviewer #2: The Introduction

Consider adding a brief discussion of the expected relationship between working memory capacity and cognitive engagement in the Introduction section to strengthen the hypotheses.

Definitions of key terms like "ambient attention," "focal attention," and "cognitive engagement" should be introduced earlier in the Introduction section in order to improve reader understanding.

The hypotheses are mentioned towards the end of the section. While they are clear, they could be better integrated into the narrative flow. Explaining how these hypotheses directly address the identified research gap would strengthen the introduction.

Related Works

Related works provides a comprehensive literature review on web accessibility, cognitive engagement, and psychological measures. However, consider adding a section summarizing the research gap to improve coherence and align with the study’s objectives. The authors should discuss how their study builds upon or challenges the findings of previous research.

Materials and methods

The sample size (20 participants) is small, limiting generalizability. Provide a stronger justification for this sample size or address its limitations directly. The authors should discuss if the use of non-native English speakers interacting with English website could bring a variability in the results. Also, the description of participant characteristics could include more demographic details (e.g., educational background, cultural factors) to clarify sample diversity.

The time allocated for interacting with each website version (60 seconds) and answering questions (45 seconds for comprehension, 15 seconds for readability and understandability) seems relatively short and the authors should justify this duration and discuss any potential effects on the results.

Results and discussion

Results are presented logically with appropriate use of visual aids and statistical tests. While the results are presented clearly, the interpretation could be more detailed. The discussion of unexpected findings, such as the lack of significant differences in reading comprehension, could be expanded. The authors should speculate on potential reasons and implications more thoroughly.

Other shortcomings

The text lacks references to images.

The authors did not sufficiently address the assumptions of using the analysis of covariance.

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Joshua Juvrud

Reviewer #2: No

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Impact of Web Accessibility on Cognitive Engagement in Individuals Without Disabilities: Evidence from a Psychophysiological Study

PONE-D-25-08059R1

Dear Dr. Ekin,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Kind regards,

Agnese Sbrollini

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

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2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: =The authors have addressed all of my previous comments clearly and thoroughly. I have no further concerns, and I believe the manuscript is much improved. I appreciate the authors' careful attention to the feedback provided.

Reviewer #2: All of my issues have been addressed. I have no further comments. I recommend this paper for publication in this journal.

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7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: Yes: Joshua Juvrud

Reviewer #2: No

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