Reading news from a pocket computer in a distracting environment: effects of the tempo of background music.

Pocket computers are often used in environments were the user becomes exposed to distracting factors, such as background noise and moving objects. In this study, I examined the effects of background music on reading business news in a crowded cafeteria environment. Measures were taken regarding three reading conditions: (1) no background music, (2) fast music and (3) slow music. The results suggest that the reading condition significantly effects both the reading measures and the emotional evaluation of the news content. Men evaluated the news most positively in the slow music condition, whereas women evaluated the news most positively in the no-music condition. The reading rate and efficiency was significantly lower in the slow-music group than in the fast-music group. The results have several implications both on background music research and on use of background music in the news services, advertising and multimodal environments.