Aging and the use of interword spaces during reading: Evidence from eye movements

Abstract

An eye movement experiment assessed the performance of young (18-30 years) and older (65+ years) adult readers when sentences contained conventional inter-word spaces, inter-word spaces were removed, or inter-word spaces were replaced by a non-linguistic symbol. The replacement symbol was either a closed square (■) that provided a salient (low spatial-frequency) cue to word boundaries, or an open square (□) that provided a less salient cue and included features (vertical and horizontal lines) similar to those found in letters. Removing or replacing inter-word spaces slowed reading times and impaired normal eye movement behavior for both age groups. However, this disruption was greater for the older readers, particularly when the replacement symbol did not provide a salient cue to word boundaries. Specific influences of this manipulation on word identification during reading were assessed by examining eye movements for a high or low frequency target word in each sentence. Standard word frequency effects were obtained for both age groups when text was spaced normally, and although the word frequency effect was larger when spaces were removed or filled, this increase was similar across age groups. Therefore, while older adults' normal eye movements were substantially disrupted when text lacked conventional interword spaces, the process of lexical access associated with the word frequency effect was no more difficult for older adults than young adults. The indication, therefore, is that although older adults struggle with the loss of conventional cues to word boundaries, this is not due to additional difficulties in word recognition.

Effects of aging and text-stimulus quality on the word-frequency effect during Chinese reading.

“…These findings are important in two respects. First, they suggests that age differences in word frequency effects in Chinese reading may be similar to those observed for alphabetic languages (Kliegl et al, 2004;McGowan et al, 2014;Rayner et al, 2006Rayner et al, , 2013Whitford & Titone, 2017), and in line with the predictions of models of eye movement control (Engbert et al, 2005;Reichle et al, 2003). Second, the findings suggest that the aging effects we observed arise from a small proportion of long fixation times on words.…”

Effects of word frequency and visual complexity on eye movements of young and older Chinese readers

“…In addition, older adults often show larger effects of word frequency, due to a disproportionate increase in fixation times for lower frequency words, consistent with older readers having greater difficulty identifying words (e.g., McGowan et al, 2014;Rayner et al, 2006Rayner et al, , 2013.…”

“…In addition, McGowan et al (2014;see also Rayner et al, 2013) compared the reading performance of young and older adults when sentences contained conventional interword spaces and when interword spaces were removed or replaced by nonlinguistic symbols. When interword spaces were absent, the older adults read more cautiously, presumably to compensate for the greater difficulty they had segmenting unspaced text.…”

Are two spaces better than one? The effect of spacing following periods and commas during reading

“…Ultimately, research on the effects of inter-word spacing and word boundary information has demonstrated that space information is extracted early in the reading process (Pollatsek & Rayner, 1982) and plays a major role in helping readers identify words and direct eye movements (Perea & Acha, 2009;Rayner et al, 1998). These conclusions are based on the finding that readers experience difficulty reading text where inter-word spaces have been filled in with another symbol (Epelboim, Booth, Ashkenazy, Taleghani, & Steinman, 1997;Johnson & Eisler, 2012;Malt & Seamon, 1978;McConkie & Rayner, 1975;McGowan, White, Jordan, & Paterson, 2014;Morris et al, 1990;Pollatsek & Rayner, 1982;Rayner et al, 1998;Spragins, Lefton, & Fischer, 1976) or word boundaries have been removed altogether (Drieghe, Fitzsimmons, & Liversedge, 2017;Johnson & Eisler, 2012;Paterson & Jordan, 2010;Perea & Acha, 2009;Rayner et al, 1998;Spragins et al, 1976). Studies that have explored the effects of increasing the inter-word spacing have shown mixed effects.…”