Does typographic design of examination materials affect performance?

The present paper reports three experiments investigating the effect typographic design of examination materials has on performance. Significant differences in performance were always found in all three experiments. These differences were always in favour of text and/or question and answer sheet layouts conforming to legibility guidelines. Participants also considered the questions with these layouts easy to answer. The main conclusion was that text and question and answer sheet layouts displaying a combination of typographic features intended to improve legibility facilitate efficient search reading and answering of questions at the perceptual level of reading. The effect of typographic layout on performance should therefore be considered in order to construct valid and reliable examination materials.