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Related Experiment Videos

Covert attention and eye movements during reading.

A W Inhoff, A Pollatsek, M I Posner

    The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology. A, Human Experimental Psychology
    |February 1, 1989
    PubMed
    Summary

    Readers can extract parafoveal information from normal text more easily than transformed text. However, attentional spotlight shifts, not letter-by-letter scans, guide eye movements during reading.

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    Area of Science:

    • Cognitive Psychology
    • Neuroscience
    • Reading Science

    Background:

    • Understanding covert attentional processes is crucial for explaining reading mechanisms.
    • Previous models proposed letter-by-letter scanning, but empirical evidence is debated.

    Purpose of the Study:

    • To investigate covert attentional processes during reading.
    • To examine how spatial transformations of text affect parafoveal information extraction.
    • To determine the role of word and letter sequence congruity in reading.

    Main Methods:

    • Monitoring eye movements during reading of normal and spatially transformed text.
    • Manipulating the congruity of letter and word sequences.
    • Varying the visible text window (fixated word only vs. fixated and succeeding word).

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    Main Results:

    • Parafoveal information extraction was reduced with transformed text but improved with practice.
    • Congruity of word and letter order did not reliably affect parafoveal extraction.
    • Congruity influenced reading performance only with normal text.

    Conclusions:

    • Covert attention in reading is not a letter-by-letter scan.
    • Attention likely operates as an asymmetric spotlight or shifts across multi-letter units (words).
    • Attentional shifts are closely coupled with eye movement direction.