scholarly journals Effects of word predictability on eye movements during Arabic reading

Author(s):  
Maryam A. AlJassmi ◽  
Kayleigh L. Warrington ◽  
Victoria A. McGowan ◽  
Sarah J. White ◽  
Kevin B. Paterson

AbstractContextual predictability influences both the probability and duration of eye fixations on words when reading Latinate alphabetic scripts like English and German. However, it is unknown whether word predictability influences eye movements in reading similarly for Semitic languages like Arabic, which are alphabetic languages with very different visual and linguistic characteristics. Such knowledge is nevertheless important for establishing the generality of mechanisms of eye-movement control across different alphabetic writing systems. Accordingly, we investigated word predictability effects in Arabic in two eye-movement experiments. Both produced shorter fixation times for words with high compared to low predictability, consistent with previous findings. Predictability did not influence skipping probabilities for (four- to eight-letter) words of varying length and morphological complexity (Experiment 1). However, it did for short (three- to four-letter) words with simpler structures (Experiment 2). We suggest that word-skipping is reduced, and affected less by contextual predictability, in Arabic compared to Latinate alphabetic reading, because of specific orthographic and morphological characteristics of the Arabic script.

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 22-31
Author(s):  
Емраг Долґунсоз ◽  
Аріф Сарісобан

During reading, readers never fixate on all words in the text; shorter words sometimes gain zero fixation and skipped by the reader. Relying on E-Z Reader Model, this research hypothesized that a similar skipping effect also exists for a second language. The current study examined word skipping rates in EFL (English as a Foreign Language) with 75 EFL learners by using eye tracking methodology. The results showed that word skipping was affected by EFL reading proficiency significantly and articles (a, an, the) were skipped more than content words. Furthermore, more skilled learners were observed to have less fixation count and skipped more words during reading while less skilled learners employed more fixations and skipped less words. Eye tracking as a novel method to observe learner development and progress in EFL reading was also discussed.  References Altarriba, J., Kroll, J. F., Sholl, A.. & Rayner, K. (1996). The influence of lexical andconceptual constraints on reading mixed-language sentences: Evidence from eye fixations andnaming times. Memory & Cognition, 24, 477–492. Balota, D. A., Pollatsek, A., & Rayner, K. (1985). The interaction of contextual constraints andparafoveal visual information in reading. Cognitive Psychology, 17, 364–388. Binder, K. S., Pollatsek, A., & Rayner, K. (1999). Extraction of information to the left of thefixated word in reading. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception andPerformance, 25, 1162–1172. Brysbaert, M., & Vitu, F. (1998). Word Skipping: Implications for Theories of Eye MovementControl in Reading. In: Eye Guidance in Reading and Scene Perception. (pp. 125–147).G. Underwood, (Ed.). Oxford: Elsevier. Carpenter, P. A., & Just, M. A. (1983). What your eyes do while your mind is reading. In: EyeMovements in Reading: Perceptual and Language processes , (pp. 275–307), K. Rayner (ed.).New York: Academic Press. Djamasbi, S., Siegel, M., Skorinko, J., & Tullis, T. (2011). Online viewing and aestheticpreferences of generation y and the baby boom generation: Testing user web site experiencethrough eye tracking. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 15(4), 121–158. Dolgunsöz, E. (2015). Measuring Attention in Second Language Reading Using Eye-tracking:The Case of the Noticing Hypothesis. Journal of Eye Movement Research, 8(5). Drieghe, D., Brysbaert, M., Desmet, T., & De Baecke, C. (2004). Word skipping in reading: Onthe interplay of linguistic and visual factors. European Journal of Cognitive Psychology,16(1–2), 79–103. Godfroid, A., Boers, F., & Housen, A. (2013). An eye for words: Gauging the role of attentionin incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition by means of eye-tracking. Studies in Second languageAcquisition, 35(3), 483–517. Henderson, J. M., & Ferreira, F. (1993). Eye movement control during reading: Fixationmeasures reflect foveal but not parafoveal processing difficulty. Canadian Journal ofExperimental Psychology, 47, 201–221. Joe, A. (1995). Text based tasks and incidental vocabulary learning. Foreign languageResearch, 11(2), 95–111. Just, M. A., & Carpenter, P. (1980). A theory of reading: From eye fixations tocomprehension. Psychological Review, 85, 109–130. Liu, P. L. (2014). Using eye tracking to understand the responses of learners to vocabularylearning strategy instruction and use. Computer Assisted Language Learning, 27(4), 330–343. McNeill, A. (1996). Vocabulary Knowledge profiles: Evidence from Chinese speaking ESLspeakers. Hong Kong Journal of Applied Linguistics 1(1), 39–63. Pollatsek, A., Reichle, E., & Rayner, K. (2003). Modeling eye movements in reading. In: TheMind’s Eyes: Cognitive and Applied Aspects of Eye Movement Research. (pp. 361–390).J. Hyona, R. Radach, & H. Deubel, (Eds.). Amsterdam: Elsevier. Radach, R., & Kempe, V. (1993). An individual analysis of initial fixation positions inreading. In: Perception and cognition: Advances in eye movement research (pp. 213–226). G.d’Ydewalle & J. Van Rensbergen (Eds.). Amsterdam: North Holland. Rayner, K. (1998). Eye Movements in Reading and Information Processing: 20 Years ofResearch, Psychological Bulletin, 124 (3), 372–422 Rayner, K., & Fischer, M. H. (1996). Mindless reading revisited: eye movements duringreading and scanning are different. Perception & Psychophysics, 58(5), 734–747. Rayner, K., & Well, A. D. (1996). Effects of contextual constraint on eye movements duringreading: a further examination. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 3, 504–509. Rayner, K., Binder, K. S., Ashby, J., & Pollatsek, A. (2001). Eye movement control inreading: word predictability has little influence on initial landing positions in words. VisionResearch, 41(7), 943–954. Rayner, K., Reichle, E. D., & Pollatsek, A. (2005). Eye movement control in reading and theE-Z Reader model. In: Cognitive Processes in Eye Guidance (pp. 131-162). G. Underwood(Ed.),. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rayner, K., Sereno, S. C., & Raney, G. E. (1996). Eye movement control in reading: acomparison of two types of models. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perceptionand Performance, 22, 1188–1200. Reichle, E., Pollatsek, A., Fisher, D. L., & Rayner, K. (1998). Toward a model of eyemovement control in reading. Psychological Review, 105, 125–157. Scarcella, R. & C. Zimmerman (1998). ESL student performance on a text of academiclexicon. Studies in Second language Acquisition, 20(1), 27–49. Schilling, H. E., Rayner, K., & Chumbley, J. I. (1998). Comparing naming, lexical decision,and eye fixation times: Word frequency effects and individual differences. Memory &Cognition, 26(6), 1270–1281. Schroeder, S., Hyönä, J., & Liversedge, S. P. (2015). Developmental eye-tracking research inreading: Introduction to the special issue. Journal of Cognitive Psychology, 27(5), 500–510. Smith, B. (2012). Eye tracking as a measure of noticing: A study of explicit recasts in SCMC.Language Learning & Technology, 16(3), 53–81. Wesche, M. & T. Paribakht (1996). Assessing vocabulary knowledge: depth vs. breadth.Canadian Modern Language Review, 53(1), 13–40. Winke, P., Gass, S., & Sydorenko, T. (2013). Factors Influencing the Use of Captions byForeign Language Learners: An Eye‐Tracking Study. The Modern Language Journal, 97(1),254–275.


2009 ◽  
Vol 101 (2) ◽  
pp. 934-947 ◽  
Author(s):  
Masafumi Ohki ◽  
Hiromasa Kitazawa ◽  
Takahito Hiramatsu ◽  
Kimitake Kaga ◽  
Taiko Kitamura ◽  
...  

The anatomical connection between the frontal eye field and the cerebellar hemispheric lobule VII (H-VII) suggests a potential role of the hemisphere in voluntary eye movement control. To reveal the involvement of the hemisphere in smooth pursuit and saccade control, we made a unilateral lesion around H-VII and examined its effects in three Macaca fuscata that were trained to pursue visually a small target. To the step (3°)-ramp (5–20°/s) target motion, the monkeys usually showed an initial pursuit eye movement at a latency of 80–140 ms and a small catch-up saccade at 140–220 ms that was followed by a postsaccadic pursuit eye movement that roughly matched the ramp target velocity. After unilateral cerebellar hemispheric lesioning, the initial pursuit eye movements were impaired, and the velocities of the postsaccadic pursuit eye movements decreased. The onsets of 5° visually guided saccades to the stationary target were delayed, and their amplitudes showed a tendency of increased trial-to-trial variability but never became hypo- or hypermetric. Similar tendencies were observed in the onsets and amplitudes of catch-up saccades. The adaptation of open-loop smooth pursuit velocity, tested by a step increase in target velocity for a brief period, was impaired. These lesion effects were recognized in all directions, particularly in the ipsiversive direction. A recovery was observed at 4 wk postlesion for some of these lesion effects. These results suggest that the cerebellar hemispheric region around lobule VII is involved in the control of smooth pursuit and saccadic eye movements.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
Jan-Louis Kruger ◽  
Natalia Wisniewska ◽  
Sixin Liao

Abstract High subtitle speed undoubtedly impacts the viewer experience. However, little is known about how fast subtitles might impact the reading of individual words. This article presents new findings on the effect of subtitle speed on viewers’ reading behavior using word-based eye-tracking measures with specific attention to word skipping and rereading. In multimodal reading situations such as reading subtitles in video, rereading allows people to correct for oculomotor error or comprehension failure during linguistic processing or integrate words with elements of the image to build a situation model of the video. However, the opportunity to reread words, to read the majority of the words in the subtitle and to read subtitles to completion, is likely to be compromised when subtitles are too fast. Participants watched videos with subtitles at 12, 20, and 28 characters per second (cps) while their eye movements were recorded. It was found that comprehension declined as speed increased. Eye movement records also showed that faster subtitles resulted in more incomplete reading of subtitles. Furthermore, increased speed also caused fewer words to be reread following both horizontal eye movements (likely resulting in reduced lexical processing) and vertical eye movements (which would likely reduce higher-level comprehension and integration).


2018 ◽  
Vol 120 (5) ◽  
pp. 2311-2324 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrey R. Nikolaev ◽  
Radha Nila Meghanathan ◽  
Cees van Leeuwen

In free viewing, the eyes return to previously visited locations rather frequently, even though the attentional and memory-related processes controlling eye-movement show a strong antirefixation bias. To overcome this bias, a special refixation triggering mechanism may have to be recruited. We probed the neural evidence for such a mechanism by combining eye tracking with EEG recording. A distinctive signal associated with refixation planning was observed in the EEG during the presaccadic interval: the presaccadic potential was reduced in amplitude before a refixation compared with normal fixations. The result offers direct evidence for a special refixation mechanism that operates in the saccade planning stage of eye movement control. Once the eyes have landed on the revisited location, acquisition of visual information proceeds indistinguishably from ordinary fixations. NEW & NOTEWORTHY A substantial proportion of eye fixations in human natural viewing behavior are revisits of recently visited locations, i.e., refixations. Our recently developed methods enabled us to study refixations in a free viewing visual search task, using combined eye movement and EEG recording. We identified in the EEG a distinctive refixation-related signal, signifying a control mechanism specific to refixations as opposed to ordinary eye fixations.


In chapter 1 we describe the method of eye-tracking and how the interest to studying eye movements developed in time. We describe how modern eye-tracking devices work, including several most commonly used in cognitive research (SR-Research, SMI, Tobii). We also give some general information about eye movement parameters during reading and a brief over- view of main models of eye movement control in reading (SWIFT, E-Z Reader). These models take into account a significant amount of empirical data and simulate the interaction of oculo- motor and cognitive processes involved in reading. Differences between the models, as well as different interpretations allowed within the same model, reflect the complexity of reading and the ongoing discussion about the processes involved in it. The section ends up with the pros and cons of using LCD and CRT displays in eye-tracking studies.


2019 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 500-512
Author(s):  
Li Zhang ◽  
Guoli Yan ◽  
Li Zhou ◽  
Zebo Lan ◽  
Valerie Benson

Abstract The current study examined eye movement control in autistic (ASD) children. Simple targets were presented in isolation, or with central, parafoveal, or peripheral distractors synchronously. Sixteen children with ASD (47–81 months) and nineteen age and IQ matched typically developing children were instructed to look to the target as accurately and quickly as possible. Both groups showed high proportions (40%) of saccadic errors towards parafoveal and peripheral distractors. For correctly executed eye movements to the targets, centrally presented distractors produced the longest latencies (time taken to initiate eye movements), followed by parafoveal and peripheral distractor conditions. Central distractors had a greater effect in the ASD group, indicating evidence for potential atypical voluntary attentional control in ASD children.


1988 ◽  
Vol 28 (10) ◽  
pp. 1107-1118 ◽  
Author(s):  
G.W. McConkie ◽  
P.W. Kerr ◽  
M.D. Reddix ◽  
D. Zola

1977 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 683-689 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amos S. Cohen ◽  
Herbert Studach

The eye fixations of 5 experienced and 4 inexperienced car drivers were analyzed while driving curves to the left and to the right. For experienced drivers in a curve to the left the mean duration of eye fixations was longer and the amplitude of the eye movements greater than in a curve to the right. No such difference was observed in inexperienced drivers who manifested neither uniformity within the same curves nor differentiation between the two types of curves. Mean duration of eye fixations of experienced subjects was shorter while driving in a curve to right, but their amplitude of eye movement was greater in a curve to left than those of inexperienced drivers. In Exp. 2, it was pointed out that there is already a change in the pattern of eye movements prior to entering a curve. Upon approaching the curve the mean duration of eye fixation decreased, and the fixations were mainly shifted toward the future driving path. Results are interpreted in terms of the adequacy of the eye fixations (supposedly influenced by prior long-term learning) for information at near distance for vehicle control and at longer distances for setting up proprioceptive forward programs for possible future sensomotoric activity.


2018 ◽  
Vol 71 (1) ◽  
pp. 20-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manuel Perea ◽  
Ana Marcet ◽  
Beatriz Uixera ◽  
Marta Vergara-Martínez

The examination of how we read handwritten words (i.e., the original form of writing) has typically been disregarded in the literature on reading. Previous research using word recognition tasks has shown that lexical effects (e.g., the word-frequency effect) are magnified when reading difficult handwritten words. To examine this issue in a more ecological scenario, we registered the participants’ eye movements when reading handwritten sentences that varied in the degree of legibility (i.e., sentences composed of words in easy vs. difficult handwritten style). For comparison purposes, we included a condition with printed sentences. Results showed a larger reading cost for sentences with difficult handwritten words than for sentences with easy handwritten words, which in turn showed a reading cost relative to the sentences with printed words. Critically, the effect of word frequency was greater for difficult handwritten words than for easy handwritten words or printed words in the total times on a target word, but not on first-fixation durations or gaze durations. We examine the implications of these findings for models of eye movement control in reading.


2011 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tessa Warren ◽  
Erik D. Reichle ◽  
Nikole D. Patson

The current study investigated how a post-lexical complexity manipulation followed by a lexical complexity manipulation affects eye movements during reading. Both manipulations caused disruption in all measures on the manipulated words, but the patterns of spillover differed. Critically, the effects of the two kinds of manipulations did not interact, and there was no evidence that post-lexical processing difficulty delayed lexical processing on the next word (c.f. Henderson & Ferreira, 1990). This suggests that post-lexical processing of one word and lexical processing of the next can proceed independently and likely in parallel. This finding is consistent with the assumptions of the E-Z Reader model of eye movement control in reading (Reichle, Warren, & McConnell, 2009).


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