Poll: Do you select text while reading?

When people see that I highlight text while I'm reading, they always want to know what practical reason it serves. The simplest answer is that it kind of helps me track the text, but it's less than that. It also isn't quite just a nervous habit. The only description that makes sense to me is that it feels like a physical connection to the page. More like spinning a pen, or rolling an object in your hand while you think about it. Like the mouse is my fingers and I'm just sort of fiddling with the page, like flicking through page edges of a book just for the feel of it.

For a long time the New York Times had a javascript thing that would pop up a dictionary reference for anything you double clicked on. As someone who compulsively doubleclicks to highlight and unhighlight, it bugged the hell out of me.

I just spastically double-click words all over the page while I'm reading. No real rhyme or reason to it, it doesn't help me read or anything. It's mostly just an unconscious tick.

Having recorded myself using a computer and watched it back to analyse my habits, I've noticed that I don't begin highlighting when reading an article but if I consciously highlight part to reread for comprehension (or to look up a word) then this triggers twitchy highlighting for the rest of the piece.

The twitchy highlighting seems to follow three patterns: bored methodical clicking to help get through big dry paragraphs, fast erratic clicking when something is exciting, and sporadic clicking when I've stopped reading to think about something in the article.

When I worked in a high school I noticed almost the exact same behaviours as described, exhibited by students and younger staff. Pretty much all the computery kids were hyperactive click-highlighters and it was only the students who seemed positively uncomfortable around computers who didn't do it at all.

I do it sometimes compulsively, but I think it started for a legitimate reason: clicking to make sure the text has focus. That way when I use up/down/PageUp/PageDown to scroll, the text actually scrolls. If there is a textbox that has focus, up or down jumps to that textbox instead which drives me bonkers.

Also, recent versions of Firefox have a bug where after you bookmark a page, if you've added a tag, the page loses focus and has to be clicked to re-focus (otherwise keyboard scrolling is broken). So far this has never bothered me quite enough to check if the bug was reported.

Edit: Since I cared enough to write about it here, I filed a bug report: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=815812

When I read the title of this post I thought "WHOA, other people do that too?!" and clicked through to take the poll. Your poll is going to have a heavy selection bias towards people who select text while reading. People who don't select text while reading will probably ignore this poll and go read an article on erlang best practices or Paul Graham's favorite color.

Over 30% of people select text while reading. Markerly.com gives publishers a dashboard of text selection and copy and paste trends. We are about to roll out heat maps that show text selection - it definitely tells a story and differs article to article.

Source: I'm CEO of Markerly and I look at this data everyday.

As a note, this appears to be in response to the top comment on the story "The greatest google mail feature you may not be using" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4838810

The comment complains about the behavior interacting poorly with text highlight reading: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4838940

I love reading (and highlighting to read) these sorts of discussions.

I select text compulsively while reading. I just double-click whatever paragraph I'm on to make it stand out from the rest of the text, and then just kind of keep clicking. Why? I have no idea, really. Just an odd habit!

This habit is an example of what Chris Noessel calls "One Free Interaction"[1]. Another prominent example is the bounce on iOS scroll views. There seems to be something about being able to fidget with a UI that makes it more comfortable to use.

[1] http://www.cooper.com/journal/2009/01/one_free_interaction.h...

I used to years ago, but eventually wrote a browser extension Paragrasp to do it: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/paragrasp/lhhabjbh... for Chrome and https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/paragrasp/ for Firefox.

If I could flip to a reading mode where the center line is the point of scrolling[1] and puts a little extra separation between the center line and lines above and below, I would not highlight. Maybe a subtle greying of the lines above and below.

[1] instead of stopping the scrolling when the first line is on the top or the last line is on the bottom, it scrolls to the middle before stopping.

I only do it when someone else is looking at the same screen as me, and there is a lot of text (not watching video together, but reading article). It's like a highlighter to coordinate reading.

No, but I tend to scroll, so the top of the browser window marks where I should read next.

I think this might go back to our reading habits on paper. I've noticed that many of my friends who use their fingers to guide their reading on paper like to highlight text or move their cursor to mark their position when web browsing.

I've never done that though, so I never felt the need to do so on a computer either.

I answered yes to the first three, because I find myself doing it for a variety of reasons at different times. The most common reason is to keep track of my place when someone calls me or walks in to my office.

The next most common reason is related to the first reason, and it's a shame that I have to do so. When you use text highlighting to track your reading (line by line), it's a sign that the site you're reading has poor typography. Usually:

Measure is too long - when lines of text are long, our eyes have a difficult time "tracking" back to the next line.

Leading is too small - Leading is the space between lines. The space between lines creates a negative void that our eyes follow back to the beginning of the next line. Not enough leading and the line is thin and hard to follow. Too much leading and your eyes get lost in a sea of space.

Yes I do, and I really notice it when using O'Reilly's Safari bookshelf. Whenever you select text it pops up a window asking if you want to highlight or make a note, so irritating! If that mouse is in my hand I always select text that I am reading. I am not sure why. Perhaps it's just a reflex so I can keep track of where I am in the text. With so much noise on web pages, it must help. I'll have to test if I do this as often on other things. I know I have accidentally cut and pasted previous commands in a terminal and have been very upset with the consequences. I'm just sloppy with that mouse and middle button I guess. But those darn new line characters on a paste can be catastrophic.

When using a Chrome browser with adblock and flashblock and HTTPS, and JS disabled, sometimes text isn't where it was designed to be. Sometimes text covers images or runs into other text, and selecting is necessary to be able to read it.

I select all the time, using either mouse or a keyboard. In addition to the mentioned problems with JS popups on click on NYTimes et al, there is another set of annoyances due to invasive keyboard shortcuts.

I select text from kbd with SHIFT+arrows (up, down, left, right) or CTRL+SHIFT+arrows (left, right) and scroll the page with arrows. I want to do something nasty to the webdev each time I'm on the page which overrides those shortcuts. Especially when it's sth like redirect to other article on ARROW_RIGHT (sigh).

Fortunately I have "Disable JS" button right in the status bar...

TL;DR: do not mess with my keyboard or I will find you!

I need to vote 3 times! I'm a yes to position reading, and place holder for sure... contrast issue is dependent on the regular contrast it doesn't happen often but I do use it that way.

Now I'm a self-confessed habitual selector I feel compelled to say that in no way, shape or form do I select text like some kind of nervous tic. I rarely select text when reading HN comments for example, they're mostly short enough so I'm not going to have to scroll or have time to get pulled on to something else before finishing.

I voted for reading position because that's the one I use it for most.

I highlight text to increase contrast, but only in situations where the "designer" has totally failed and done something terrible like put dark color text on a black background.

Excellent question! I've been wondering this for the past two years...made an annotator based off of this idea.

I found that most people select because they are holding the mouse - they have to use it if they are holding it. Then sometimes you select to preserve your position while scrolling.

This also led me to believe that people digest information in chunks. Highlighted text serves as a "todo" - must finish reading the highlighted block of text before diverting focus to something else.

I am absolutely amazed at the response this poll is getting. You people are a bunch of freaks! ;)

I frequently select text when I need to get up from my desk at home to deal with the kids (and not lose my place), but not to the extent that other here are describing, unless it's the random tick click thing.

I'm sure there's a psychologist in our midst that can explain this phenomenon. But, I'm still shocked that this post has generated this much attention.

I have a co-worker that constantly selects and re-selects text in everything from web pages to Sublime Text. I think he's developed some weird form of subconscious text-selection syndrome. He literally cannot stop doing it even when we bring it up to him.

It's really bad doing remote screensharing because the screen has to constantly redraw.

I've never seen the behavior before. It's quite odd. I never select text except for copy/cut operations.

I never consciously asked myself why I select text, until now. As a result, it wasn't something I did. Fascinating question. It is purely a mouse-driven habit, too, by the way.

I now wonder if all my years selecting text in old versions of Internet Explorer (to see how pages were built in HTML) was partly to blame? This technique was useful to see where clear gifs and other artifacts were often hiding.

I do. But I'm also one of those people that will highlight text in 'real' books using a marker. I read destructively, you really don't want to be the next person in line after I'm 'done' with a textbook.

And being able to permanently highlight stuff on the screen so that when I re-visit a page later and it still contains my highlights is something I miss.

To be honest, never really thought about why I select the text before.

People make fun of me for doing it, but I can't stop. It's the one thing that makes google reader hard to use, because I forget and clicking on a news story makes it jump to the top of the page (note to google reader devs - your thing is awesome, probably needs an update, but GOD DAMN I HATE THE CLICK JUMP FUNCTION)

Science says yes:

http://jeffhuang.com/Final_CursorBehavior_CHI11.pdf

More precisely, the paper above ("No Clicks, No Problem") demonstrates that tracking cursor movements provides useful predictive value of reader interest. Selecting text is a special case of this.

On a related note, at least in Windows, when triple-clicking to select a paragraph, immediate subsequent clicks (any number) do absolutely nothing.

This really bothers me when selecting words because sometimes I triple-click instead of double-click by accident, and I want to undo this but it requires waiting.

1) When scrolling is erratic (due to the mouse, the browser, or what have you) and reading a long article, I highlight a word in the last-read paragraph to allow me to scroll that paragraph up and not lose it.

2) When pages have low contrast, but I don't want to say View / Style / No Style (alt+v, y, n - in firefox), I'll select the whole page.

3) When pages have extra-wide text lines without sufficient spacing between lines (i.e., they do not conform to typographical rules for reading ... for example, Hacker News comments), I'll select individual lines in order to better follow the length of the line.

4) When interrupted in reading a lengthy article, so as not to lose my place, I'll double-click (middle wheel button is keyed to double-click) my reading position to highlight just that word.

Didn't answer, I'd like to choose "Yes, all of the above"

I do it as a nervous habit.

I've gone through different phases of this as a tool to fight my ADD impulses. My main reason was to avoid that scenario where I would find myself reading and then snap and ask myself "where the hell am I in this paragraph/page/article?" I highlighted sentence by sentence as I read through, but it results in too many iterations. Then I highlighted whole paragraphs, worked better but reading through blue colored background when there's white background all around it made my eyes drift away to the lighter areas. Now I'm highlighting the paragraph prior to the one I'm in, it serves as a bookmark of sorts. It's still a work in progress but its damn better than not doing it!

> If these are common actions, perhaps browsers (or add-ons) can provide purpose-built features for these functions.

Maybe this is one of those cases where nothing actually needs to be done. Highlighting is highlighting, it works great and fulfills different needs. There are lots of add-ons for focus, black-out, markers and other features, but none is widely used.

In adittion, we are moving towards touch interfaces. I haven't seen anyone frantically touching the screen to highlight text in those; as some have confessed here, I believe this behavior has a lot to do with the mechanical act of clicking, the sound and feedback that for some reason feels good and ends up becoming a compulsion.

I used to scroll. Then I started scrolling so that the line I am reading is always the first line in the window (thus obscuring everything above), which means I can read about tracking downwards, and I don't have muck about with text selection.

I do it to reduce contrast, not increase it. White on black is awfully harsh. Never use black: http://ianstormtaylor.com/design-tip-never-use-black/

The only time I do it is when the the columns are very wide in paragraph text and flowing from one line to the next is difficult. Sometimes increasing font size so less words fit in a column accomplish the same thing, though.

I am a selector, partly by habit/something to do, and partly to track position, especially in wider formats. Newspapers are in columns for a reason! On one site I frequent, it took me a minute to figure out why I kept going to random other websites. I was keeping the mouse out of the way on the (rather large) margins, and apparently the full screen border ad was clickable anywhere that wasn't the center content column or navigation. Just blank space down the page, but I'd click it to select rows of text, and get carted off to the ad website. I suppose that's one way to monetize a strange habit...

Tracking the reading position with a visual guide is one of the fundamental techniques in many speed reading methods.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_reading

I was once developing a message board. It had a threaded message model and a high resolution of notifications, so when entering a thread with multiple new messages, the new messages where all highlighted with a different background color.

I implemented a JS feature where double click on a message body would send mark-as-read to the server via AJAX and remove the background color. When the feature entered testing, almost all the testers opposed it, as their behaviour with double clicking to select words or paragraphs they were reading was affected.

The feature was never deployed.

I find myself semi randomly selecting things on pages when I'm reading through something quickly or skimming through a page. If something catches my eye, I'll select it as or before I read it.

I don't do it habitually, but it's invaluable for all those web pages where the author thought blinking yellow text on a magenta background was neat...

[Not just myspace and old geocities sites...I run into this sort of thing all too often, even on "real" (modern, corporate, well-funded, etc) websites. Sometimes it's just that the site designer seemed to be going for some sort of artistic/funky look, but in other cases the site looks fine in ie6 but becomes unreadable in FF or chrome... >< ]

For long articles, or content I really want to digest, I copy the text into a text file in a directory in my home space (with original URL and under git control). When I get to it, I delete the lines I've read, or add notes to follow up with more research or comments. This is all under automated git commits, so I can track my reading backlog at any point in time, and can go back to an article 6 months ago that I may have "deleted" simply by searching my automated commits.

Interesting! I've never heard of this or even seen anyone do it.

What also makes reading a lot more comfortable is the clipr bookmarklet: http://code.google.com/p/clipr/

I do this, and another "silly" thing I do is when I copy something to the clipboard, I often hit cmd-c three or four times quickly. I don't remember why or when I picked up this habit. I imagine maybe at some point I had a system or program that didn't always register the copy the first time? Or maybe it's just completely random. But I don't even notice I'm doing it until someone points it out and asks me about it.

In the days before mouse wheels, I always used selecting to scroll: If you move the mouse downwards while selecting, you'll start to scroll. This was nice until mouse wheels were invented.

Nowadays I often still click the middle mouse button to enter a scroll mode where there's a cursor with arrows on the screen. Moving it scrolls. Unfortunately this feature was removed in Visual Studio 2010, but an extension brings it back.

Holy fuck, I thought it was just me.

I think I do it more with black on white. I find it difficult to focus reading from a large bright screen.

I do find I end up not bothering to read a lot of articles I'd like to online, end up either bookmarking and ignoring, or just skimming over. Think it's because reading long articles in a particular layout is a chore. A layout browser extension might help, I should give it a try.

Sometimes I select text for my own internal emphasis. If I see something important I select it as a way to reinforce its importance to myself.

I do this cause I just like to interact with the graphics. Especially if it's a Mac and you have all those nice quartz effects like when you highlight, then click and drag so that the text is floating above some other part of the screen, disembodied from the article.

I pause to think a lot when I read, so this is just sort of fidgeting while my mind thinks about something, I suppose.

My God. I always thought I'm just one of those few who do it, be for a reason or without a reason - I just keep on selecting text while reading. And that's why - I ABSOLUTELY HATE those overly smart websites which on any random selection show a 'search/definition/wikipedia' buttons just below my mouse, and on the next select I accidentally press that stupid button!

For those using selecting to track reading position, I built a chrome extension that specifically solves this problem.

I haven't started promoting it yet because of a bug in incognito mode but it's available at:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/magicscroll-web-re...

I believe it should be a standard feature on browsers to have some identifier or horizontal line so that when scrolling or page-down, you know where to pick up.

I use highlight to mark the current position that i 'm reading, then mouse-scroll up/down to read some text i missed.

Ideally, i would like to keep the last 2-3 text selections that I made highlighted.

I also hate Nytimes and PLoS for hijacking my selections

Only select a sentence or two when I need to scroll back up and long page and get back to where I was reading quickly afterwards.

The obvious reason that people do this is because of wider and wider screens. Some web pages or applications still show text that fills the width of windows. If you have to turn your head back and forth, then you are much more likely to lose your line on a large block of text. It's much easier to pick out the next line with a line marker.

I don't do it all the time, but when I do it's usually to increase contrast, or to mark my place in long text that I'll need to come back to.

I also do it to find the mouse cursor. The text cursor is thin and not always easy to find amongst a large wall of text, so I'll click and start dragging and look to where the page is highlighted in order to find it.

Coincidentally, I know of a new web service (http://amazd.com) that lets you record your highlights as you're reading an article (in the most natural way I could imagine) so you can save the parts that were insightful. That's the only reason I usually highlight text when reading these days.

To be totally honest, it's part tracking my reading position and part to settle my idle hands & pacify my ocd tendencies

I generally use the keyboard to do everything it can on the computer, including to navigate long articles. I use the arrow keys to keep whatever I'm reading near the top of the page. In fact, if there were an easy way to keyboard-navigate the entire internet, short of scrolling around with the arrow keys, I'd never touch my mouse.

I'm glad to see others do this.

I don't think I would use a browser plugin; selecting with the mouse is completely satisfying for whatever reason I do it.

I think it's a way for me to feel connected with the text, too. reading a book, I either trace with my finger or a piece of paper I slide down the page (not word-for-word, but by sentences and paragraphs).

I used to select text much more than I do now. When I was taking the Series 7 exam, I was selecting so much text and clicking as I did so, that the exam software froze (I was about 75% done with the test). Luckily the system reboot didn't result in any data loss- I'm not sure who was happier, the test proctor or me ;).

Based on what people are saying here, I think there are a lot of different styles.

For instance I have a friend who frantically selects and reselects small portions of the text the whole time. I on the other hand just highlight a line and hold shift then down arrow at the end of each line I know exactly which line is next to be read.

No.

In terms of add-ons, I'd really like something that combines the function of a speed reader like spreeder [1] with the "articlization" of Pocket [2].

1: http://www.spreeder.com/app.php?intro=1 2: http://getpocket.com

In an HCI class I took over 10 years ago at university I did an eye gaze study where I was the observee. The professor noticed that I selected text as I went along to help focus on where I was reading.

Good to know that there are others like me out there. I wonder if there are any practical implications for this?

Constantly. Spastically.

Unless I'm on the nytimes website.

Some HTML/CSS design decisions leave me selecting to read, if not just copying and pasting into a text editor.

I used to do this quite often when reading on a laptop with an external mouse, as an alternative to scrolling, so I could see where I was, especially on single page/printer friendly views.

Having an iPad and doing a lot of reading on Flipboard has "untrained" me, and I don't think I do it anymore on any platform.

This is how I can tell my roommate is reading: he constantly double clicks, probably once every other second.

The top story on HN is about how Gmail only includes the highlighted section of an email in the reply. This is the bane of my life for this reason! Highlight a paragraph to read it, hit reply, and only that paragraph is included in the response. Most unintentionally annoying feature ever.

I would hate it if browsers started getting in the way with my text selection. The best thing about it is that it works almost everywhere.

I don't select text when I read something in the terminal, though, only in GUI applications. I guess I don't like lines being selected completely for some reason.

Compulsively. It bothers other people.

The Evelyn Wood speed reading system recommends using your finger on a page to trace lines of text. When reading long passages on the computer, I achieve the same goal by highlighting. I generally only do this when reading longer content: never when reading comments on HN.

No. It messes with my clipboard, hard. So I try not to do it, I like to have a clean clipboard history for re-use.

BUT: I tend to select-all + copy any text of a form (this comment) before submitting. You never know when browser/back/website/connection is going to abandon you.

I just do it as habit. It's hard to pick the category from those above. It's probably a combination of "to track my reading position" and "to increase text contrast" but I don't consciously set out to do either of those. It's really just a harmless habit.

Anyone highlighting text for the contrast will love this Chrome extension: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hacker-vision/fomm...

I don't, and it bugs the hell out of me when I'm sat reading with someone else who does. Nothing more distracting than them going nuts with the mouse while I'm trying to read.

I get why people do it, but sheesh, take your hands off the mouse for a minute, it won't kill you!

I never even realized I did this until my wife asked me what the heck I was doing one day. I'm still not sure why I'm highlighting all the time, but sometimes it is to keep my place when I scroll the page. Other times it is completely subconscious.

No, but I do scroll the page up, so that the line I'm reading aligns with the top of the browser viewing area.

Some sites nowadays add a floating header to the top of the page that changes size as you scroll down which is super distracting when reading the way I do.

no,

but i'm surprised nobody brought this up yet: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefox/addon/reasy/

you select text and it turns it into some speed reading format. tiny plugin and plain awesome

I was shocked to find out after my Google interview that you can see your collaborator selecting text in Google Apps. I was nervously selecting wafts of text constantly throughout the whole thing. I never heard from them afterwards :/

I never thought about highlighting text to increase contrast. Is there some way to change the default selection text color and background color? I would love to make the selection background color black to really max out the contrast.

Restless fingers. The other people in my office must think that I'm playing games all day, considering that the uninterrupted rapid-fire stream of clicks I produce when my hand is on the mouse is indistinguishable from playing an FPS.

I used to.

But I stopped selecting text right after... perhaps I began using a WebKit based browser. Sometimes, text selection in WebKit based browsers looks ugly and weird compared with that in Firefox, however, these browsers are just damned fast.

I picked placeholder but I also just randomly select as I go along sometimes with no reason at all. So I kind of track my position but not really because I can track it fine without it but do it sometimes randomly anyway.

I sometimes do it when fast-reading through something and click on some sections (single or multiple words) which got my attention. And then I read on.

It helps me to keep things in my short-term memory or to actually extend my short-term memory.

I thought I was the only one who did this. Interestingly, I do it much less when using the Clearly Chrome plugin from Evernote. https://evernote.com/clearly/

I do it. It does not help me in any way. It annoys people reading with me or sharing my screen. It baffles even myself. But by god, I cannot help it.

Have you tried selecting text and doing circles or rectangles? Amazing satisfaction!

I'm a heavy trackpad user, I'll scroll the window to the text I'm reading. Even if I'm half way through the page, I'll scroll the next paragraph to the top of the window. That's how I "record" my reading position.

I do it all the time. Also, when using Safari, I often pinch in and out while reading. The rendering gets blurry until I lift the fingers, and the moment the text is crisp again, I feel certain satisfaction.

Yes, to track my reading position, but only when I'm exhausted.

I doubt I'd have enough brain juice left at this stage to remember to use an add-on.

But it would be nice for very large texts, sparsely read and on normal attention conditions.

Not only that but I also click randomly as well. This can get me into trouble, particularly on sites which have giant "background ads".

Notably, I don't do this at all with trackpads, only when using a mouse at the desktop.

I have on occasion, just when the text is one giant wall, I start having a hard time finding the next line without re-reading the line I just read. If I highlight the previous line I know not to read it.

I tend to use it for sites that have low line-heights. Like this site. The wide page and low line-height make it really hard for me to read. For reading content I'd say a min of 160% line-height.

I've been using Readability a lot for the last one year. FYI, using it ever more after I discovered that you can send the article to kindle with the stoke of a few keys (mine is Shift+Control+K)

Sometimes, when the paragraph is wide, it's hard to continue reading on the same line and that interrupts and slow my reading down. I do it so that I stay on the same line. Sort of like a ruler

Does anyone else want to answer "Yes" for all of those reasons?

It's such a relieving feeling when you realize that you are not alone.

Yes, completely. Usually to track what I am reading or to change the colour, but sometimes for the same reason I draw random boxes with the selection tool on my desktop.. because I fidget.

I do it primarily as a way to track my place in the text when I scroll down the page. Or because, forever multitasking and getting distracted, I need a way to remember where I was up to.

I just randomly select blocks of text on the screen. Usually text that I am not currently reading. I don't scroll, I don't use it to highlight where I'm reading. I just do it for fun.

I don't do it when I'm using a trackpad, but I do when I'm using a mouse.

Interesting.

> Yes, as a placeholder to pick up reading later

This is my answer, and it's a habit I picked up while using Skype, since they don't track my position very well when new messages comes in. (OS X)

Easiest way to read my comments on HN. After I've been down-voted.

Back when I used a mouse, I always worried that my compulsive selecting drained my mouse battery faster than it needed to. It probably added a lot to my WhatPulse stats as well.

I typically don't UNLESS I'm on wikipedia...It's way too common for me to look up one article and end up with 10 or so tabs of different topics/words from the first article...

I do it as a nervous tick. It consumes me as OCD usually does.

Sometimes I highlight from the middle of one line of text to the middle of the next line of text, trying to get the start and end of the highlight to line up exactly.

We've all heard about the multitasking-induced attention problems. I tend to select and deselect text frequently as something to keep the ADD part of my brain busy.

Only when I am changing font sizes on the page, to bookmark where I am. Browsers tend to jump around an article when you do this and it's easy to lose your place.

I occasionally do, but some spam-happy sites will pop up all sorts of crap when you click on their page. So I'm fairly cautious about where I'm willing to click.

I "select all" on pages that use bright on dark text, e.g. yegg's and jwz's blogs. Otherwise they are virtually impossible to read for longer than a minute.

Usually - when I'm reading - I don't have my hand on the mouse... Just they keyboard, so no... Funny how many people do... It would seem distracting to me.

No, but I obsessively scroll down so that the paragraph that I'm reading touches the top of the viewport. The last few paragraphs become a pain of course.

I don't at all, but I still think it's a very interesting concept I'd love to see taken further. I almost felt bad hitting "No" because of it.

Maybe I'll become a convert.

For me, it's just been a habit since immemorial times. Growing up in the 90s, I had access to Win95 from the start, and I can't remember not doing this.

When I'm reading something really intense, it helps me focus -both visually and mentally, on say two or three paragraphs at a time, before moving on.

Anyone else play with the highlighting on their iPhone constantly?

I can't read anything on my iPhone without constantly messing with the highlight UI. It's so fun.

I've always considered myself a slow reader. I feel that highlighting words/sentences on a web page helps me read quicker (for whatever reason).

I do this.

I just attributed this to ADD. But I do like the contrast.

> Yes, but for some other reason

It's a compulsive habit that I can't stop, it serves no practical reason whatsoever. I also bite my nails. Same problem.

Yes i use text selection to scroll especially on trackpads : begin selection of text near window edge then scroll while selecting further.

No, but I can understand why, based on the responses so far. Makes sense. I'd think they'd be more useful if they were saved somewhere.

Sometimes I manipulate a touch screen when I read a long and dense text but that's just to prevent the mobile device from sleeping.

A lot of times I'll select some text on a page right before I scroll to help my eye focus and track where I am on large text pages.

I select text to copy/paste to Twitter. So frustrating that there's no comparable CTRL/CMD + C, CTRL/CMD + V commands on Android.

I didn't when I used default selection color. I remember starting doing it because I really enjoyed OS X yellow selection option.

Hell no, selection is too distracting, and the margin above / under the selected text is too small to allow comfortable reading.

You all are nuts.

* Contrast

* Search web for highlighted terms

* Open new tab with selected link (when no proper anchor provided or when I want to open some part of given link)

Yep, it's one of the things I miss when I'm reading on a multi-touch screen - that extra tool of interaction with the page.

Yes, usually for reading code if the syntax highlighting gets screwed up by one of the Chrome extensions I have installed.

I select text and have osx's speech to text read it to me while i'm reading. That way I can read way more and way faster.

Sometimes as a bookmark. Mostly however, because lines are too long (I will sometimes resize the browser to fix this).

It's one of the reasons I hate surfing snoops. I'd spend a lot more time there if I could highlight when I'm reading.

I do this, because it helps me remember important points, cause I tend to read highlighted points twiceover or more.

With reading tools like dotdotdot.me selecting text makes even sense in the longterm. building a kind of memory...

I do sometimes when I'm on a desktop, but other wise it slows me down way too much. And I'm rarely on a desktop.

HackerNews is the only place I've ever heard of this happening :) In the "wild", I've never witnessed it once, so I'm actually curious what it means. Do you select the entire block of text you are in the process of reading? Do you drag your mouse cursor along as you read? Isn't this horribly frustrating most of the time with all bad style sheets and ad overlays and embedded ads, etc, on most big news sites?

I'm super surprised people do this. Generational gap? I'm 25 and absolutely never would think to do this.

I have to, sometimes, when I read a site with a fancy new design (with grey text). Other than that, no.

I've seen people do this and I've wondered why they do. Thanks for answering this intriguing question!

I sometimes select text while reading to track my reading position. Sometimes as a nervous tic/add.

When the lines are ridiculously long and/or there isn't enough line spacing. Like on Hacker News.

I don't do this. I feel left out now

So, this poll didn't tell me a simple question: do more people select text while reading or not?

I often double click on a paragraph to highlight all of it, and keep track of where I'm reading.

No, I read the whole page top-down and press the "space" key to scroll down to the next page.

I just randomly select text as I'm reading. In fact I find it annoying when I cannot do so.

I do it all the time without thinking about it. I have no idea why. Please help me. :(

Yes I do it as a tick. In fact I realized I was doing it while reading these comments.

Compulsively. I hate it when my magic mouse sometimes registers it as a right click.

I don't, but I've always wished there were a way to bookmark position within a page.

For me, it helps me pick up where I left off reading when scrolling down the page.

Yeah, but only if the text is unreadable(there's too much text in one paragraph).

I usually don't need to unless the design makes it hard for me to keep my place.

Only if the text is multiple paragraphs, otherwise it's too much of a hassle.

I do that every time. And I don't need any app/add-on for that. Please, no.

No, because I'm using vimium most of the time I am reading in my browser.

Yes: OCD.

I repeatedly click and drag, click and drag. I have no idea why I do it.

Yes, many times i seek more about a word or expression. Or to translate.

Yep, it focuses my eyes.

While pair programming, it tends to drive the other person nuts.

No idea why I do it. I think I just like to do something with my hands.

both to increase contrast and figure out where the heck I am. But I also have a safari extension that shades alternate paragraphs as I read them , so I do it much less often now.

checkout Hakim's fokus.js if you like to highlight while reading, I run the script in console when I am note-taking (hand writing notes, based on browser text) - very convenient!

Yes, to track my reading point and sometimes to increase contrast.

Yes, to track my reading position Yes, to increase text contrast

Yep...trackpoint on Thinkpads tends to fix this problem for me.

I used to do this several years ago. Not doing anymore. :-)

No - but I've never used a highlighter in meatspace either.

I like to read longer articles with the diigo highlighter.

Used to. Since using a touchpad I am no longer doing it.

I used to do this for scrolling. Weird habit, actually.

Yes, I search for stuff to know more about the subject.

Yes, but sometimes like difficult papers and articles.

Am I the only one who read this as:

"Poll: Do you text while driving?"

No I don't. I also don't move my lips while reading.

I also do this to scroll the page at the same time.

Also to copy the text to look it up in a dictionary

I don't do it. I've always seen people doing that.

Nice to know im not alone in the world about this

I do it to make sure I followed what is written.

Yes, but I'm ashamed to admit it to my friends.

No, i follow with the mouse but don't select.

Yes, because I am neurotic. (No, really.)

No. I avoid using the mouse if possible.

Yes, for contrast and reading position

I'd say a combination of the top two.

Cool, I thought about asking this :)

But I do underline, here and there.

woah, this is fascinating to me. I've never heard of someone highlighting text while reading

i select text so that when i scroll down, i can quickly see where i was, to continue reading.

Yes, to track my reading position.

Yes, to track my reading position

To mark my place when scrolling.

adblock the js that is triggered by highlighting (e.g. NY Times dictionary lookup).

Yes. I do for multiple reasons

"I like to move it, move it."

Yes,for intra-page bookmark

i think i do it to make the text feel 'tactile' and thus more engaging

And how many also are OCD?

Select to copy, of course.

correlations to age and wearing glasses would be interesting

Yes, most certainly.

yes, helps me to focus on the paragraph i am reading

Yes, just by habit!

It helps me focus.

Yes. All the time!

this is why I love the 3 finger drag in osx.

Yes, stimming.

No

Yes

No

Yes sir.

Yes.

yes, always :)

no

yes

No

I don't understand how people do this unless they just read really slowly. It's maddening to try to do and have it actually be where you're reading.

It also kills me that HN seems to embrace this practice, yet is also so incredibly skeptical of SSS and dyslexia.

Yes, and I thought about posting about this a here lot of times to know if people also do this because of how much I hate websites that remap the arrows to "next/previous article", it must stop!

Never select text on readonly documents (like reading emails) for purposes other than copying/pasting.

Yes, it is a motor tic & possibly a bad habit.