Eye tracking during conventional neuropsychological assessments of spatial neglect

Spatial neglect (SN) is a common cognitive disorder after stroke, characterized by lateralized attention deficits. Correctly identifying SN and its subtypes is crucial for treatment and recovery. Following, we examined eye movement measurements as an addition to a conventional test for assessing SN. We recorded eye movements during the presentation of the Cookie Theft image for people with left-sided SN (n = 13), right-sided SN (n = 3), and controls (n = 6). Participants with SN were neurological patients. People with left-sided SN allocated more attention to the right side of the screen (i.e. proportion of right fixations, fixation time, and mean fixation location) relative to controls, especially during the early viewing phase (i.e. the first 25% of the viewing duration). Many of these differences were also evident at an individual level. For people with left-sided SN, allocating more attention to the right side of the screen (i.e. gaze position) was strongly correlated with neglect severity (i.e. Catherine Bergego Scale scores). Eye tracking metrics derived from neuropsychological assessments can be clinically relevant and suitable for individual-level analyses. By enabling a fine-grained assessment of attention allocation/gaze position, eye tracking could give added benefit to neuropsychological assessments of SN.