1,721,006 research outputs found
Eye movements in reading versus nonreading tasks: Using E-Z Reader to understand the role of word/stimulus familiarity
No full textIn this article, we extend our previous work (Reichle, Pollatsek, & Rayner, 2012) using the principles of the E-Z Reader model to examine the factors that determine when and where the eyes move in both reading and non-reading tasks, and in particular the role that word/stimulus familiarity plays in determining when the eyes move from one word/stimulus to the next. In doing this, we first provide a brief overview of E-Z Reader, including its assumption that word familiarity is the "engine" driving eye movements during reading. We then review the theoretical considerations that motivated this assumption, as well as recent empirical evidence supporting its validity. We also report the results of three new simulations that were intended to demonstrate the utility of the familiarity check in three tasks: (1) reading; (2) searching for a target word in embedded in text; and (3) searching for the letter O in linear arrays of Landolt Cs. The results of these simulations suggest that the familiarity check always improves task efficiency by speeding its rate of performance. We provide several arguments as to why this conclusion is not likely to be true for the two non-reading tasks, and in the final section of the paper, we provide a fourth simulation to test the hypothesis that problems associated with the mis-identification of words may also curtail the too liberal use of word familiarity
Using E-Z Reader to simulate eye movements in nonreading tasks: a unified framework for understanding the eye–mind link
No full textNonreading tasks that share some (but not all) of the task demands of reading have often been used to make inferences about how cognition influences when the eyes move during reading. In this article, we use variants of the E-Z Reader model of eye-movement control in reading to simulate eye-movement behavior in several of these tasks, including z-string reading, target-word search, and visual search of Landolt Cs arranged in both linear and circular arrays. These simulations demonstrate that a single computational framework is sufficient to simulate eye movements in both reading and nonreading tasks but also suggest that there are task-specific differences in both saccadic targeting (i.e., decisions about where to move the eyes) and the coupling between saccadic programming and the movement of attention (i.e., decisions about when to move the eyes). These findings suggest that some aspects of the eye-mind link are flexible and can be configured in a manner that supports efficient task performance
Eye movements and word skipping during reading revisited
Full text linkTwo experiments examined word skipping in reading. In Experiment 1, skipping rates were higher for a preview of a predictable word than for a visually similar nonword, indicating full recognition in parafoveal vision. In Experiment 2, foveal load was manipulated by varying the frequency of the word preceding either a 3-letter target word or a misspelled preview. There was again a higher skipping rate for a correct preview, and a lower skipping rate when there was a high foveal load, but there was no interaction, and the pattern of effects in fixation times was the same as in the skipping data. Experiment 2 also showed significant skipping of nonwords similar to the target word, indicating skipping based on partial information
The Role of Words in Chinese Reading
No full textThe Chinese writing system (and the underlying language) is different from European writing systems (and their underlying languages) in many ways. The most obvious difference is the nonalphabetic form of the Chinese written language, although there are also differences in relation to representations of lexicality, grammaticality, and phonological form. This chapter focuses on issues associated with the nonalphabetic nature of the written form of Chinese and the fact that words are not demarcated by spaces. Despite the surface differences in the orthographies between European languages and Chinese, there is considerable evidence to show that the word is a salient unit for Chinese readers. Properties of words (such as word frequency) as well as character properties (such as character frequency) affect measures of reading time and also affect where eye movements are targeted when passages of text are being read for meaning
Mislocated fixations can account for parafoveal-on-foveal effects in eye movements during reading
No full textContrasting predictions of serial and parallel views on the processing of foveal and parafoveal information during reading were tested. A high-frequency adjective (young) was followed by either a high-frequency wordn (child) or a low-frequency wordn (tenor), which in turn was followed by either a correct (performing) or an orthographic illegal wordn + 1 (pxvforming) as a parafoveal preview. A limited parafoveal-on-foveal effect was observed: There were inflated fixation times on wordn when the preview of wordn + 1 was orthographically illegal. However, this parafoveal-on-foveal effect was (a) independent of the frequency of wordn, (b) restricted to those instances when the eyes were very close to wordn + 1, and (c) associated with relatively long prior saccades. These observations are all compatible with a mislocated fixation account in which parafoveal-on-foveal effects result from saccadic undershoots of wordn + 1 and with a serial model of eye movement control during reading
Eye movements and non-canonical reading: comments on Kennedy and Pynte (2008)
No full textKennedy and Pynte [Kennedy, A., & Pynte, J. (2008). The consequences of violations to reading order: An eye movement analysis. Vision Research, 48, 2309–2320] presented data that they suggested pose problems for models of eye movement control in reading in which words are encoded serially. They focus on situations in which pairs of words are fixated out of order (i.e., the first word is skipped and the second fixated prior to a regression back to the first word). We strongly disagree with their claims and contest their arguments. We argue that their data set was obtained selectively and the events they believe are problematic do not occur frequently during reading. Furthermore, we do not consider that Kennedy and Pynte’s arguments pose serious difficulties for serial models of reading such as E-Z Reade
Encoding multiple words simultaneously in reading is implausible
No full textSeveral prominent models of reading posit that attention is distributed to support the parallel lexical processing of multiple words. We contend that the auxiliary assumptions underlying this attention-gradient hypothesis are not well founded. Here, we address three specific issues related to the ongoing debate about attention allocation during reading: (i) why the attention-gradient hypothesis is widely endorsed, (ii) why processing several words in parallel in reading is implausible and (iii) why attention must be allocated to only one word at a time. Full consideration of these arguments supports the hypothesis that attention is allocated serially during reading
Parafoveal processing during reading is reduced across a morphological boundary
Full text linkA boundary change manipulation was implemented within a monomorphemic word (e.g., fountaom as a preview for fountain), where parallel processing should occur given adequate visual acuity, and within an unspaced compound (bathroan as a preview for bathroom), where some serial processing of the constituents is likely. Consistent with that hypothesis, there was no effect of the preview manipulation on fixation time on the 1st constituent of the compound, whereas there was on the corresponding letters of the monomorphemic word. There was also a larger preview disruption on gaze duration on the whole monomorphemic word than on the compound, suggesting more parallel processing within monomorphemic words
The interpretation of ambiguous trimorphemic words in sentence context
Full text linkMany trimorphemic words are structurally and semantically ambiguous. For example, unlockable can either be un-lockable (can’t be locked) or unlock-able (can be unlocked). Which interpretation is preferred and whether prior sentence context affects the initial interpretation is not clear from prior research. The present experiment embedded ambiguous trimorphemic words in sentence context and manipulated whether prior context disambiguated the meaning or not and examined the pattern of fixation durations on the ambiguous word and the remainder of the text. The results indicated that the unlock-able interpretation was preferred; moreover, prior context did not exert a significant effect until the eyes had initially exited from the target word
The word grouping hypothesis and eye movements during reading
No full textThe distribution of landing positions and durations of first fixations in a region containing a noun preceded by either an article (e.g. the soldiers) or a high-frequency three-letter word (e.g. all soldiers) were compared. Although there were fewer first fixations on the blank space between the high-frequency three-letter word and the noun than on the surrounding letters (and the fixations on the blank space were shorter), this pattern did not occur when the noun was preceded by an article. Radach (1996) inferred from a similar experiment that did not manipulate the type of short word that two words could be processed as a perceptual unit during reading when the first word is a short word. As this different pattern of fixations is restricted to article- noun pairs, it indicates that word grouping does not occur purely on the basis of word length during reading; moreover, as we demonstrate, one can explain the observed patterns in both conditions more parsimoniously, without adopting a word grouping mechanism in eye movement control during reading
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