Time course of visual information utilization during fixations in reading

College students read short texts from a cathode-ray tube as their eye movements were being monitored. During selected fixations, the text was briefly masked and then it reappeared with one word changed. Subjects often were unaware that the word had changed. Sometimes they reported seeing the first presented word, sometimes the second presented word, and sometimes both. When only one word was reported, two factors were found to determine which one it was: the length of time a word was present during the fixation and the predictability of a word in its context. The results suggested that visual information is utilized for reading at a crucial period during the fixation and that this crucial period can occur at different times on different fixations. The pattern of responses suggested that the first letter of a word is not utilized before other letters and that letters are not scanned from left to right during a fixation.     

Similarity-based interference during language comprehension: Evidence from eye tracking during reading

The nature of working memory operation during complex sentence comprehension was studied by means of eye-tracking methodology. Readers had difficulty when the syntax of a sentence required them to hold 2 similar noun phrases (NPs) in working memory before syntactically and semantically integrating either of the NPs with a verb. In sentence structures that placed these NPs at the same linear distances from one another but allowed integration with a verb for 1 of the NPs, the comprehension difficulty was not seen. These results are interpreted as indicating that similarity-based interference occurs online during the comprehension of complex sentences and that the degree of memory accessibility conventionally associated with different types of NPs does not have a strong effect on sentence processing.     

Time course of linguistic information extraction from consecutive words during eye fixations in reading

Sequential attention shift models of reading predict that an attended (typically fixated) word must be recognized before useful linguistic information can be obtained from the following (parafoveal) word. These models also predict that linguistic information is obtained from a parafoveal word immediately prior to a saccade toward it. To test these assumptions, sentences were constructed with a critical pretarget-target word sequence, and the temporal availability of the (parafoveal) target preview was manipulated while the pretarget word was fixated. Target viewing effects, examined as a function of prior target visibility, revealed that extraction of linguistic target information began 70-140 ms after the onset of pretarget viewing. Critically, acquisition of useful linguistic information from a target was not confined to the ending period of pretarget viewing. These results favor theoretical conceptions in which there is some temporal overlap in the linguistic processing of a fixated and parafoveally visible word during reading.     

Tracking spatial information during reading: a cue-based process

The goal of the present set of experiments was to examine whether a cue-based mechanism could account for how, and under what conditions, spatial information is tracked. In five experiments, reading times were measured for a target sentence that contradicted the earlier-described location of a protagonist. When the target sentence contained either one or two cues to earlier spatial information (Experiments 1a-1c), reading times were disrupted. When all cues were eliminated (Experiments 2a and 2b), reading time were disrupted only when readers were instructed to take the perspective of the protagonist. The combined results of all five experiments are consistent with a cue-based mechanism: Readers encode spatial information but do not update earlier-encoded spatial information except in response to specific text characteristics (i.e., cues to earlier spatial information) or task demands (e.g., an instruction to read from the perspective of the protagonist) that increase the accessibility of earlier-encoded spatial information.     

Use of colour for language processing during reading

The study examined whether literal correspondence is necessary for the use of visual features during word recognition and text comprehension. Eye movements were recorded during reading and used to change the colour of dialogue when it was fixated. In symbolically congruent colour conditions, dialogue of female and male characters was shown in orchid and blue, respectively. The reversed assignment was used in incongruent conditions, and no colouring was applied in a control condition. Analyses of oculomotor activity revealed Stroop-type congruency effects during dialogue reading, with shorter viewing durations in congruent than incongruent conditions. Colour influenced oculomotor measures that index the recognition and integration of words, indicating that it influenced multiple stages of language processing.     

Temporal analyses of children's comprehension during oral reading

Second- and fourth-grade children read aloud one normal story then two stories that contained an anomalous phrase in the third of five sentences. The anomalies were produced by reversing the order of two predicate nouns. The rate of articulation was slower and total pause time was greater when children read the anomalous sentences than when they read the normal sentences. While the anomalous sentences were read literally, all but a few children restored the anomalous phrase to its original meaning or changed some of the words to make the anomalous event more plausible. The results of the study suggest that temporal measures are highly sensitive to comprehension processes and that children comprehend the story as they read and compare what they read with what they know about the world.     

Eye-fixation patterns during reading confirm theories of language comprehension

Eye-movement patterns during reading are consistent with proposition-by-proposition models of speech comprehension. (1) Fixation times are least affected by word length at ends of clauses: this confirms the theory based on the study of speech comprehension that, at such points, attention is directed inward to text integration. (2) Fixation time for words at the end of clauses is longer for canonical sequences which conform to the pattern, “N-V-N = actor-action-object”; this confirms the view that complete semantic integration of such sequences is routinely delayed until their completion. A two-variable model based on principles of exhaustive visual search and speech comprehension accounts for 80% of the fixation durations in a sample paragraph from Just and Carpenter (1980) and Thibodeou, Just ond Carpenter (1982). This comprehension-based model compares favorably with their models constructed within a production-system framework. This result clarifies the relationship between reading and listening.     

Spanish-English L2 speakers' use of subcategorization bias information in the resolution of temporary ambiguity during second language reading

Using a self-paced moving window reading paradigm, we examine the degree to which structural commitments made while 60 Spanish-English L2 speakers read syntactically ambiguous sentences in their second language (L2) are constrained by the verb's lexical entry about its preferred structural environment (i.e., subcategorization bias). The ambiguity under investigation arises because a noun phrase immediately following a verb can be parsed as either the direct object of the verb 'The CIA director confirmed the rumor when he testified before Congress', or as the subject of an embedded complement 'The CIA director confirmed the rumor could mean a security leak'. In an experiment with 59 monolingual English participants, we replicate the findings reported in the previous literature demonstrating that native speakers are guided by subcategorization bias information during sentence interpretation. In a bilingual experiment, we then show that L2 subcategorization biases influence L2 sentence interpretation. The results indicate that L2 speakers keep track of the relative frequencies of verb-subcategorization alternatives and use this information when building structure in the L2.     

Time in language: event duration in language comprehension

This work investigates how we process and represent event duration in on-line language comprehension. Specifically, it examines how events of different duration are processed and what type of knowledge underlies their representations. Studies 1–4 examined verbs and phrases in different contexts. They showed that durative events took longer to process than non-durative events and that the duration attributed to the stimulus events correlated with on-line processing times. Studies 5 and 6 indicated that durative events occur in semantically more diverse contexts and elicit semantically more diverse associations than non-durative events. Semantic and contextual diversity also correlated with attributed durations and processing times. Results indicate that (a) event-specific durations are computed on-line from multiple unfolding cues, (b) processing cost and duration representations emerge from semantic and contextual diversity reflecting our experience, and (c) key components of duration representations may be situation-specific knowledge of causal and contingency relations between events.     

Interaction of stimulus and contextual information during reading: Identifying words within sentences

In general, studies on the effects of a sentence context on word identification have focused on how context affects the efficiency of processing a single target word, presented separately from the context. Such studies probably would be incapable of measuring contextual facilitation resulting from cascaded or parallel processing of neighboring words within a sentence. To measure these and other types of facilitation, we presented entire phrases and sentences for subjects to read as fast as possible and to monitor for nonwords. Subjects read at rates representative of natural reading. Experiment 1 demonstrated a large contextual facilitation effect on decision time. Experiment 2 showed that facilitation is caused by specific semantic information and, perhaps to a greater degree, by nonpredictive syntactic information. Experiment 3 showed that the amount of facilitation is greater than could be accounted for by separate contributions from autonomous word level and sentence level processes. These results present difficulties for an autonomous model of reading, but are consistent with interactive models, in which the results of ongoing sentential analyses are combined with stimulus information to identify words.     

Parent language with toddlers during shared storybook reading compared to coviewing television

This study compares parent language directed at their toddlers while coviewing toddler-directed television and while storybook reading. Participants were 15- or 30- month-old children and their parent. A quantitative analysis of parent language revealed that it is more frequent, rich, and complex during reading relative to television viewing regardless of child age; although parents used more complex language and more diverse words with older children. The difference between media held even when the storybook text read aloud was not considered in the analysis. Consistent with the results of earlier research, shared book reading produces more and richer verbal interactions with toddlers than coviewing television and is thus more likely to positively influence early language development.     

Pathways to reading: the role of oral language in the transition to reading

What is the role of oral language in reading competence during the transition to school? Is oral language in preschool best conceptualized as vocabulary knowledge or as more comprehensive language including grammar, vocabulary, and semantics? These questions were examined longitudinally using 1,137 children from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development. Children were followed from age 3 through 3rd grade, and the results suggest that oral language conceptualized broadly plays both a direct and an indirect role in word recognition during the transition to school and serves as a better foundation for early reading skill than does vocabulary alone. Implications of these findings are discussed in terms of both theoretical models of early reading and practical implications for policy and assessment.     

Electrical measurement of internal information processing during silent reading and listening

When one listens, one “says what one hears.” In reading, one “says what one sees,” following which, one “hears what one says.” The processes of intermodal transfer and of phonetic coding to achieve lexical-semantic processing are hypothesized. The technologic consequence is that covert oral behavior (subvocalization) during silent reading is beneficial to children and should not be tampered with by the teacher.     

The forgotten remindings: Personal remindings examined through self-probed retrospection during reading and writing

Remindings are spontaneously arising recollections of past personal experiences that are instrumental in that they occur in response to an ongoing task to which they are perceived as being related. While related areas of research have found the number of off-task thoughts to decrease with the difficulty of the on-going task, task difficulty has yet to be examined in remindings. Here we present a series of studies examining the effects of task difficulty on remindings as well as further examining the phenomenological characteristics of remindings. Experiments 1–3 provide evidence that the frequency of remindings during different types of reading and writing task decreases with increasing difficulty associated with the parallel task. Experiment 4 shows that the content of remindings varies systematically with characteristics of the parallel task, indicating their context dependency and potential instrumentality. Findings are discussed in relation to research on mind wandering and involuntary autobiographical memories.     

Parafoveal preview benefits during silent and oral reading: Testing the parafoveal information extraction hypothesis

The preview of a parafoveally visible word conveys benefits when it is subsequently fixated. The current study examined whether these benefits are determined by the effectiveness of parafoveal information extraction, as implied by current models of eye movement control during reading, or by the effectiveness with which extracted information is integrated when a previewed word is fixated. For this, the boundary technique was used to manipulate the extent to which parafoveal information could be extracted, and text was read silently or orally. Consistent with prior work, a parafoveal target word preview conveyed fewer benefits when less parafoveal information could be extracted, target viewing durations were longer during oral than during silent reading, and the two factors interacted in the target fixation data, with smaller preview benefits during oral than during silent reading. Survival analyses indicated that this occurred because parafoveal information use occurred at later point in time during oral reading. Diminished opportunity for parafoveal information extraction also diminished target skipping rate, and it resulted in smaller saccades to target words, but these effects were not influenced by reading mode. Parafoveally extracted information was thus used less effectively during oral reading only when it involved the integration of parafoveally extracted information during subsequent target viewing. The dissociation of extraction from integration challenges current models of eye movement control.     

Letter processing and font information during reading: Beyond distinctiveness, where vision meets design

Letter identification is a critical front end of the reading process. In general, conceptualizations of the identification process have emphasized arbitrary sets of distinctive features. However, a richer view of letter processing incorporates principles from the field of type design, including an emphasis on uniformities across letters within a font. The importance of uniformities is supported by a small body of research indicating that consistency of font increases letter identification efficiency. We review design concepts and the relevant literature, with the goal of stimulating further thinking about letter processing during reading.     

语义和句法信息在副中央凹加工中的作用

读者能够从副中央凹中提取到什么类型的信息, 是当前阅读眼动研究领域关注的焦点问题.当前普遍认为低水平信息(如正字法信息)可以在副中央凹中得以加工, 但是高水平的信息(如语义和句法信息)能否从副中央凹中进行提取存在争议.本文总结了近年来高水平信息在副中央凹加工的研究进展, 包括拼音文字和非拼音文字(如中文)阅读过程中语义和句法预视效益的研究现状及影响因素, 当前眼动控制模型(如E-Z读者和SWIFT)对预视效益的解释和不足之处, 最后提出未来关于语义和句法预视加工的研究方向.