Eye movements and word skipping during reading: effects of word length and predictability

Eye movements were monitored as subjects read sentences containing high- or low-predictable target words. The extent to which target words were predictable from prior context was varied: Half of the target words were predictable, and the other half were unpredictable. In addition, the length of the target word varied: The target words were short (4-6 letters), medium (7-9 letters), or long (10-12 letters). Length and predictability both yielded strong effects on the probability of skipping the target words and on the amount of time readers fixated the target words (when they were not skipped). However, there was no interaction in any of the measures examined for either skipping or fixation time. The results demonstrate that word predictability (due to contextual constraint) and word length have strong and independent influences on word skipping and fixation durations. Furthermore, because the long words extended beyond the word identification span, the data indicate that skipping can occur on the basis of partial information in relation to word identity.     

The effect of word frequency, word predictability, and font difficulty on the eye movements of young and older readers

Young adult and older readers' eye movements were recorded as they read sentences containing target words that varied in frequency or predictability. In addition, half of the sentences were printed in a font that was easy to read (Times New Roman) and the other half were printed in a font that was more difficult to read (Old English). Word frequency, word predictability, and font difficulty effects were apparent in the eye movement data of both groups of readers. In the fixation time data, the pattern of results was the same, but the older readers had larger frequency and predictability effects than the younger readers. The older readers skipped words more often than the younger readers (as indicated by their skipping rate on selected target words), but they made more regressions back to the target words and more regressions overall. The E-Z Reader model was used as a platform to evaluate the results, and simulations using the model suggest that lexical processing is slowed in older readers and that, possibly as a result of this, they adopt a more risky reading strategy.     

预期性、词频和笔画数对中文词汇识别影响的眼动研究

本研究采用眼动追踪技术,通过对预期性和词频、预期性和笔画数在词汇识别过程中是否存在交互作用进行考察,以探讨预期性效应对词汇识别产生影响的加工阶段。结果显示,预期性和词频、预期性和笔画数之间均不存在交互作用。由此表明,预期性、词频和笔画数均独立地对中文文本阅读中的词汇识别产生显著的影响,该结果符合E-Z读者模型的研究假设。     

Immediate and delayed effects of word frequency and word length on eye movements in reading: a reversed delayed effect of word length

Three experiments examined the effects in sentence reading of varying the frequency and length of an adjective on (a) fixations on the adjective and (b) fixations on the following noun. The gaze duration on the adjective was longer for low frequency than for high frequency adjectives and longer for long adjectives than for short adjectives. This contrasted with the spillover effects: Gaze durations on the noun were longer when adjectives were low frequency but were actually shorter when the adjectives were long. The latter effect, which seems anomalous, can be explained by three mechanisms: (a) Fixations on the noun are less optimal after short adjectives because of less optimal targeting; (b) shorter adjectives are more difficult to process because they have more neighbors; and (c) prior fixations before skips are less advantageous places to extract parafoveal information. The viability of these hypotheses as explanations of this reverse length effect on the noun was examined in simulations using an updated version of the E-Z Reader model (A. Pollatsek, K. Reichle, & E. D. Rayner, 2006c; E. D. Reichle, A. Pollatsek, D. L. Fisher, & K. Rayner, 1998).     

The effects of root frequency, word frequency, and length on the processing of prefixed English words during reading

Two experiments were performed to investigate the roles of root morpheme frequency and word frequency in the encoding of prefixed words in sentence context. Two alternative words, which were equated on other indices but differed with respect to either root morpheme frequency or word frequency, were embedded in the same sentence frame. In Experiment 1, there was a significant root morpheme frequency effect on gaze duration but only a marginal word frequency effect. Post hoc analyses indicated that word length influenced both effects, with word frequency effects predominating for shorter words and root morpheme effects predominating for longer words. In Experiment 2, word length was also manipulated. There was a significant root frequency effect for longer prefixed words and a significant word frequency effect for shorter prefixed words. The results were best explained by a dual-route model (with competing whole-word access and compositional routes), in which increasing word length inhibited the whole-word process, relative to the compositional route.     

中文阅读预视加工中的词频和预测性效应及其对词切分的启示:基于眼动的证据

研究采用眼动随动显示技术考察中文阅读预视加工中的词汇加工问题。前三项实验发现,剥夺预视加工的掩蔽条件、正确提示词n+1右侧边界的掩蔽条件以及不能提示词n+1右侧边界的掩蔽条件都不影响词频效应,说明中文读者对词n+1处文字的预视加工达不到词汇水平。实验4考察剥夺预视加工的掩蔽条件、提示词n+1右侧边界的掩蔽条件对预测性效应的影响,结果发现,剥夺预视加工完全消除预测性效应,提示词n+1右侧边界则减少预测性效应,说明对词汇的预期加工是中文读者切分词n+1的参考线索。综合4项实验结果可知,中文读者较难通过自下而上的文字识别切分词n+1,自上而下的词汇预期则是切分词n+1的加工形式。     

Inflection,frequency, and the word superiority effect

Summary It has been known for nearly 100 years that single words presented tachistoscopically are better recognized than arbitrary letter strings. The present experiments investigate the impact of the morphological structure of words and of word frequency on the word superiority effect. It has been shown that inflected word forms show higher reaction time and error scores in the lexical decision task and higher error scores in the Reicher-Wheeler paradigm. Word frequency also determines lexical decision time. However, no frequency effect in the Reicher-Wheeler paradigm could be found. The results are discussed in the framework of McClelland and Rumelhart's (1981) model of context effects in letter search.This paper is mainly (Experiments I and III) based on the first author's Habilitationsschrift from October, 1982 (cf. Günther 1983a).     

Integration of pragmatic and phonetic cues in spoken word recognition

Although previous research has established that multiple top-down factors guide the identification of words during speech processing, the ultimate range of information sources that listeners integrate from different levels of linguistic structure is still unknown. In a set of experiments, we investigate whether comprehenders can integrate information from the 2 most disparate domains: pragmatic inference and phonetic perception. Using contexts that trigger pragmatic expectations regarding upcoming coreference (expectations for either he or she), we test listeners' identification of phonetic category boundaries (using acoustically ambiguous words on the /hi/～/∫i/ continuum). The results indicate that, in addition to phonetic cues, word recognition also reflects pragmatic inference. These findings are consistent with evidence for top-down contextual effects from lexical, syntactic, and semantic cues, but they extend this previous work by testing cues at the pragmatic level and by eliminating a statistical-frequency confound that might otherwise explain the previously reported results. We conclude by exploring the time course of this interaction and discussing how different models of cue integration could be adapted to account for our results.     

Memorability, word frequency and negative recognition

Brown (1976) has provided an analysis of the effect of the memorability of an item on the confidence with which it is accepted or rejected in a test of recognition or recall. When the subject has no clear recollection of the inclusion of an item in an input list, he is assumed to evaluate its memorability in the context of the experiment before he decides whether to accept or reject it. If the judged memorability is high, the absence of a clear recollection is stronger evidence against the item than if it is low. A specific prediction is that memorable distractors in a recognition test will be more confidently rejected than non-memorable ones. This prediction was tested and confirmed in three experiments in which recognition was tested by 4-category rating. Except in Experiment I, items memorable to individual subjects were identified by administering a questionnaire. For example, in Experiment III forenames of immediate family were assumed to have high memorability. This experiment also included word frequency as a variable. Low-frequency distractors were rejected significantly more firmly than high-frequency distractors: extraction of memorable names enhanced this effect. The relationship of memorability to word frequency is discussed.     

Idioms in sentences: Effects of frequency,literalness, and familiarity

This study investigated the relationship between subjective frequency of literal usage (literalness), subjective frequency of figurative usage (familiarity), and mean Kucera and Francis (1967) word frequency for idiom phrases. Kucera and Francis frequency was found to be independent of both familiarity and literalness. Furthermore, it was found that literalness, but not the Kucera and Francis frequency of the words in the phrase, affected reading time for literal uses of idioms. For figurative uses of idioms, familiarity and written frequency interacted. A model of idiom processing consistent with the current results and previous results is proposed. In addition, subjective familiarity and literalness norms are provided for 245 idioms.Portions of the normative study were based upon subjects in Schweigert and Cronk (1992).     

Backward recall and the word length effect

The word length effect, the finding that words that have fewer syllables are recalled better than otherwise comparable words that have more syllables, is one of the benchmark effects that must be accounted for in any model of serial recall, and simulation models of immediate memory rely heavily on the finding. However, previous research has shown that the effect disappears when participants are asked to recall the items in strict backward order. The present 2 experiments replicate and extend that finding by manipulating the participant's foreknowledge of recall direction (Experiment 1) and by giving the participant repeated practice with one direction by blocking recall direction (Experiment 2). In both experiments, a word length effect obtained with forward but not backward recall. The results are problematic for all models that currently have an a priori explanation for word length effects. The finding can be accounted for but is not predicted by Scale-Independent Memory, Perception, and Learning (SIMPLE), a model in which item and order information are differentially attended to in the 2 recall directions.     

Tracking the time course of phonetic cue integration during spoken word recognition

Speech perception requires listeners to integrate multiple cues that each contribute to judgments about a phonetic category. Classic studies of trading relations assessed the weights attached to each cue but did not explore the time course of cue integration. Here, we provide the first direct evidence that asynchronous cues to voicing (/b/ vs. /p/) and manner (/b/ vs. /w/) contrasts become available to the listener at different times during spoken word recognition. Using the visual world paradigm, we show that the probability of eye movements to pictures of target and of competitor objects diverge at different points in time after the onset of the target word. These points of divergence correspond to the availability of early (voice onset time or formant transition slope) and late (vowel length) cues to voicing and manner contrasts. These results support a model of cue integration in which phonetic cues are used for lexical access as soon as they are available.