2021 – 2025

Augmented Reality (AR) books offer new opportunities for interaction and engagement, and additional features provide potential to support children’s reading comprehension, yet there is currently very little research in this area.  This project aims to capture and understand children’s (aged 7-10) experiences with AR books, specifically focusing on how it shapes children’s reading engagement, and whether, to what extent, and how, AR books have potential to support and engage children with reading difficulties.

Academic publications:

Alhamad, K., Manches, A., & McGeown, S. (2025). Increasing Book-Talk and Extending Reading Experiences Among Children with Reading Difficulties: The Role of Augmented Reality Books. Reading Psychology, https://doi.org/10.1080/02702711.2025.2523056

Alhamad, K., Manches, A., & McGeown, S. (2024) Augmented Reality Books: In-depth insights into children’s reading engagement.  Frontiers in Psychology:  https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1423163/full

Research paper for children:

Alhamad, K., Manches, A., & McGeown, S. (2025). Augmented Reality books: Reshaping our reading experiences.  Frontiers for Young Minds, https://kids.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frym.2025.1472981

Blogpost:

Alhamad, K. (2023). BERA Special Issue Blogpost: https://www.bera.ac.uk/blog/technology-to-support-reading-engagement-should-schools-include-augmented-reality-ar-books-on-their-shelves

To learn more about this project you can contact Sarah McGeown: s.mcgeown@ed.ac.uk

Project Team:

PhD Researcher: Kawla Alhamad, University of Edinburgh

First Supervisor: Professor Sarah McGeown, University of Edinburgh
Second Supervisor: Professor Andrew Manches, University of Edinburgh

You can access the preregistration for the first study in this project, here: https://osf.io/9q678

You can access the preregistration for the second study in this project, here: https://osf.io/x6r4z