Deaf signers target saccades more accurately to the optimal viewing position when reading

Where a reader's eyes land in a word both reflects and affects their word processing efficiency. Readers tend to land short of the center of a word, missing the optimal viewing position (OVP), especially when they skipped the previous word. Once they land, landing position error, or the deviation from the OVP, leads to shorter fixations-an inverted optimal viewing position (IOVP) effect. However, deaf readers who are early signers are highly efficient-they read faster, skip more words without negatively impacting their comprehension-and this efficiency may be related to their saccade targeting ability. We investigated the landing positions and fixation durations for reading level-matched deaf and hearing readers in a study run from 2022 to 2024. We found that deaf readers (a) landed closer to the OVP, indicating more accurate saccade targeting and (b) showed smaller differences between landing positions following skipping compared to nonskipping saccades, suggesting their increased word skipping does not incur a penalty like skipping does for hearing readers. They exhibited similar inverted optimal viewing position effects as hearing readers, suggesting their increased saccade targeting accuracy does not come at a cost to word processing. We discuss how their overall reading efficiency may be due in part to their ability to target saccades accurately to the OVP, even after they skip the previous word, and the possibility that this might be related to their wider reading spans. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).