The impact of syntax colouring on program comprehension

Wepresentanempiricalstudyinvestigatingtheeffectofsyntaxhighlightingonprogram comprehension and its interaction with programming experience. Quantitative data was captured from 10 human subjects using an eye tracker during a controlled, randomised, within-subjects study. We observe that syntax highlighting significantly improves task completion time, and that this effect becomes weaker with an increase in programming experience.