The timing of spontaneous eye blinks in text reading suggests cognitive role

A growing body of research suggests that spontaneous eye blinks have a cognitive role in addition to their biological functions. Blinking has been associated with cognitive effort and with processes related to the dynamic nature of incoming sensory information, such as the release of attention. However, there is limited evidence supporting the cognitive role of spontaneous blinks, specifically during reading. This study provides the first systematic investigation of blinking patterns in eye-tracking data of naturalistic silent text reading. We hypothesized that blinks would be more likely to occur (1) around punctuation marks signaling a breakpoint in the text and (2) following fixations on lower-frequency and less predictable words. To test these hypotheses, we utilized data from the large Ghent Eye Tracking Corpus (GECO), which contains eye movement data from 15 participants who read an entire novel in silence. The results indicate higher blinking proportions at punctuation marks compared to other positions in the text. Additionally, blink rates were modulated by word frequency and predictability, with higher word frequencies and predictabilities significantly reducing the probability of blinking. Extending previous research, our findings suggest substantial cognitive regulation of blinking during reading.