Accounting for regressive eye-movements in models of sentence processing: A reappraisal of the Selective Reanalysis hypothesis

Mitchell, Don; Shen, Xingjia Rachel; Green, Matthew James; Hodgson, Timothy L.

doi:10.1016/j.jml.2008.06.002

Cited by 95 publications

(133 citation statements)

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“…In a similar vein, other researchers (e.g., Kennedy, Brooks, Flynn, & Prophet, 2003) have proposed that maintaining a record of the identities of words Postview Effects in Reading 20 passed by forward saccades helps assimilate information acquired at each new fixation with that acquired previously (see also Mitchell, Shen, Green, & Hodgson, 2008). Consequently, and in line with these views, corrupting the letter content of leftward text during a saccade (as in the present study) should increase the difficulty with which information acquired across successive fixations can be assimilated, and this is consistent with the increased reading time, the increased duration and frequency of fixational pauses, and the disruption to saccades that were observed in this study.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

A further look at postview effects in reading: An eye-movements study of influences from the left of fixation.

Jordan¹,

McGowan²,

Kurtev³

et al. 2016

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cogni

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When reading from left to right, useful information acquired during each fixational pause is widely assumed to extend 14-15 characters to the right of fixation but just 3-4 characters to the left, and certainly no further than the beginning of the fixated word. However, this leftward extent is strikingly small and seems inconsistent with other aspects of reading performance and with the general horizontal symmetry of visual input. Accordingly, two experiments were conducted to examine the influence of text located to the left of fixation during each fixational pause using an eye-tracking paradigm in which invisible boundaries were created in sentence displays. Each boundary corresponded to the leftmost edge of each word so that, as each sentence was read, the normal letter content of text to the left of each fixated word was corrupted by letter replacements that were either visually similar or visually dissimilar to the originals. The proximity of corrupted text to the left of fixation was maintained at 1, 2, 3, or 4 words from the left boundary of each fixated word. In both experiments, relative to completely normal text, reading performance was impaired when each type of letter replacement was up to two words to the left of fixated words but letter replacements further from fixation produced no impairment. These findings suggest that key aspects of reading are influenced by information acquired during each fixational pause from much further leftwards than is usually assumed. Some of the implications of these findings for reading are discussed.Key Words: Reading, perceptual span, eye-movements Postview Effects in Reading 3 Normal reading relies on making saccadic eye-movements along lines of text and ending each movement with a brief fixational pause, during which time information is acquired (for a review, see Rayner, 2009). However, the area of text from which the information acquired at each fixational pause actually influences reading (the perceptual span) appears to be quite limited. In particular, assessments of the perceptual span are typically obtained using eye-tracking techniques in which areas of text extending leftwards or rightwards from each point of fixation are displayed normally during reading while text outside these areas is deliberately corrupted (e.g., by substituting different letters for the originals). Since these techniques were first introduced (McConkie & Rayner, 1975, 1976, it has become reported as standard that the findings show that skilled reading of languages read from left to right (such as English) is influenced by information from an asymmetric area that extends 14-15 characters to the right of fixation but no more than 3-4 characters to the left, and certainly no further leftwards than the beginning of each fixated word.Indeed, this standard view continues to be reported widely in the literature (e.g., Blythe, 2014;Rayner, 2014;Rayner, Yang, Schuett, & Slattery, 2014;Veldre & Andrews, 2014;Risse, Hohenstein, Kliegl & Engbert, 2014;Yan, Zhou, Shu, & Kliegl, 2015), ind...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

A further look at postview effects in reading: An eye-movements study of influences from the left of fixation.

Jordan¹,

McGowan²,

Kurtev³

et al. 2016

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cogni

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Accordingly, although maintaining a linguistic record of words can help integrate information acquired at each new fixation with that acquired previously along the same line (for discussions, see Mitchell, Shen, Green, & Hodgson, 2008), the low-level, spatial-frequency content of text may provide further, non-linguistic cues to help each age group maintain a cohesive matching of information acquired within central vision with that seen previously in other locations.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reading with filtered fixations: Adult age differences in the effectiveness of low-level properties of text within central vision.

Jordan¹,

McGowan²,

Paterson³

2014

Psychology and Aging

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The ability to read is crucial for functioning effectively in everyday life. However, numerous studies indicate that many aspects of reading performance differ between young adults (aged 30 years and under) and older adults (aged 65 years and over; e.g., Kliegl, Grabner, Rolfs, & Engbert, 2004; Rayner, Castelhano, & Yang, 2009;Rayner, Reichle, Stroud, Williams, & Pollatsek, 2006; see also Laubrock, Kliegl, & Engbert, 2006) and these differences are widely attributed to normal sensory and cognitive decline. But the precise nature of the differences in reading performance that occur as adults reach older age has yet to be fully determined.Of particular importance is that the eyes move when reading and make a series of brief fixational pauses, with the effect that different areas of text can be viewed within central vision (an area approximately 2° wide around the point of fixation; for a review, see Rayner, 2009).Crucially, during these pauses, the visual system acquires only low-level visual properties from text and these visual properties then provide the bases for the subsequent linguistic analyses that ultimately allow readers to make sense of what they are seeing (e.g., Allen, Smith, Lien, Kaut, & Canfield, 2009;Lovegrove, Bowling, Badcock, & Blackwood, 1980;Patching & Jordan, 2005a, 2005b. Indeed, the low-level properties of text falling within central vision provide a range of different scales of visual analysis (spatial frequencies) that are associated with different aspects of the text being read. So, for example, lower spatial frequencies allow readers to see a word's coarse overall shape but not its fine detail, whereas higher spatial frequencies allow readers to see a word's fine detail, such as the precise form of individual letter features (e.g., Allen et al., 2009;Jordan, 1990Jordan, , 1995Kwon & Legge, 2012;Legge, Pelli, Rubin, & Schleske, 1985; Patching & Jordan, 2005a,b). Thus, although spatial frequency analyses in central vision are unlikely to be apparent to the reader, reading relies fundamentally on these low-level visual properties of text. But it is unclear whether the effectiveness of spatial frequencies within central vision shown by young adults remains unaltered in older age. Of particular significance is that normal aging produces a characteristic decline in sensitivity to various scales of spatial frequency, especially to higher spatial frequencies within central vision, due to a combination of optical changes and changes in neural transmission (for discussions, see Derefelt, Lennerstrand, & Lundh, 1979;Elliott, 1987;Higgins, Jaffe, Caruso, & deMonasterio, 1988;Laubrock et al., 2006;Owsley, 2011). As a result, older adults may be less able than young adults to process the visual detail of text falling within central vision during fluent reading, and this change may affect reading performance. Indeed, it is widely assumed that reading relies greatly on visual detail from within central vision (e.g., Engbert, Nuthmann, Richter, & Kliegl, 2005;Reichle, Rayner, & Pollatsek, 2003; see als...

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“…However if re-reading behavior is driven by the re-allocation of attention to the location of previously encoded text, then eye movement behavior may not necessarily be driven by visual re-sampling of words, and re-reading behavior may be similar regardless of text availability (no effect of text replacement permanence). Another possibility, perhaps especially if re-reading behavior ordinarily provides "time out" for continued text processing (Mitchell et al, 2008), is that there may be sufficient flexibility in the eye movement control systems that different eye movement behaviors may arise, even if comprehension is unchanged. For example, longer first-pass reading times might compensate for shorter re-reading times.…”

Section: Eye Movement Control During Re-readingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These procedures are not designed to be sensitive to subtle differences in comprehension (for example, integration with prior knowledge), which are beyond the scope of this article. Other work indicates that spatial layout, in addition to linguistic guidance, can also modulate targeting of regressions (Mitchell et al, 2008). To summarize, a range of factors are likely to contribute to the processes underlying programming of the metrics of regressive saccades.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Spontaneous rereading within sentences: Eye movement control and visual sampling.

White

Lantz

Paterson

2017

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Perfor

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Three experiments examine the role of previously read text in sentence comprehension and the control of eye movements during spontaneous re-reading. Spontaneous re-reading begins with a regressive saccade and involves re-inspection of previously read text. All three experiments employed the gaze contingent change technique to modulate the availability of previously read text. In Experiment 1 previously read text was permanently masked either immediately to the left of the fixated word (beyond wordn) or more than one word to the left (beyond wordn-1). The results of Experiment 1 indicate that the availability of the word immediately to the left (wordn-1) is important for comprehension. Experiments 2 and 3 further explored the role of previously read text beyond wordn-1. In these studies text beyond wordn-1 was replaced, retaining only word length information, or word length and shape information. Following a regression back within a sentence, meaningful text either re-appeared or remained unavailable during re-reading. The experiments show that the visual format of text beyond wordn-1 (the parafoveal postview) is important for triggering regressions. The results also indicate that, as least for more complex sentences, the availability of meaningful text is important in driving eye movement control during rereading. Keywords: re-reading, eye movements, regressionsSpontaneous re-reading within sentences 2 Considerable research has been undertaken into the nature of word recognition and eye movement control as the eyes initially move forward through text (Rayner, 2009).Models of eye movement control now provide good accounts of such "first-pass" reading behavior (Engbert, Longtin, & Kliegl, 2002, Reichle, Pollatsek, Fisher, & Rayner, 1998.Some research has also been undertaken into the processes underlying the re-reading that occurs for repeated readings of text (Hyönä, & Niemi, 1990;Raney, & Rayner, 1995).However compared to studies of reading during first-pass, relatively few studies have examined eye movement control for spontaneous re-reading. That is, re-reading of previously read text that occurs following a spontaneous regression back in the text. Ten to fifteen percent of fixations during reading are regressive (Rayner, 2009), hence spontaneous re-reading is a key aspect of the reading process.Re-reading may occur as a result of processing difficulty associated with text comprehension (e.g. Just & Carpenter, 1980; for a review see Clifton, Staub, & Rayner, 2007) or falling confidence in the identity of previously read words (Bicknell & Levy, 2010). Models of eye movement control predict that post-lexical processing modulates the likelihood of regressing back in the text (Engelmann, Vasishth, Engbert, & Kliegl, 2013;Reichle, Warren, & McConnell, 2009). However it is notoriously difficult to study the mechanisms underlying spontaneous re-reading as it does not always occur, and when it does occur, the timing and location of the re-reading is variable (von der Malsburg, Kliegl, & Vasishth, 2015; ...

show abstract

Accounting for regressive eye-movements in models of sentence processing: A reappraisal of the Selective Reanalysis hypothesis

Cited by 95 publications

References 75 publications

A further look at postview effects in reading: An eye-movements study of influences from the left of fixation.

A further look at postview effects in reading: An eye-movements study of influences from the left of fixation.

Reading with filtered fixations: Adult age differences in the effectiveness of low-level properties of text within central vision.

Spontaneous rereading within sentences: Eye movement control and visual sampling.

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