WORD FAMILIARITY EFFECTS IN EFL READING: AN EYE TRACKING STUDY

Do you know what happens in mind when we encounter a novel word while reading a newspaper, a paragraph or a short story? Via eye tracking technique, this study aimed to gather clues about how our mind reacts to an unknown word while we read in another language by examining word familiarity effects on eye movements during EFL reading. After a vocabulary test, eye movements of 60 EFL learners at intermediate level were recorded while they read identical sentence pairs including words with different length and frequency. The results showed that (1) total time spent on words and reanalysis times were predicted by vocabulary knowledge, (2) initial word processing was not predicted by vocabulary size (3) unfamiliar words attended more attention and required more cognitive effort than familiar words, (4) familiar words are processed in similar time spans for English as L1 and L2 but unfamiliar words cause more cognitive load in EFL. The results were discussed in comparison to L1 eye movement research in reading and were evaluated regarding EFL reading in terms of noticing hypothesis, incidental vocabulary acquisition and EFL reading instruction.

Eye Movements during Barking at Print

In order for educational software coupled with eye-tracking capability to respond with pedagogical appropriateness to a reader’s eye movements, reading metrics must be validly interpreted. These metrics and the types of reading they diagnose, for example, scanning, skimming and reading for meaning, come largely from reading fiction texts in a home language. The use of existing classification systems for disadvantaged South African learners did not yield consistent and credible classification of these learners’ reading. This could be attributed to learners barking at print, that is, decoding the text without comprehending what they were reading beyond the word level. Eye movements of barkers and non-barkers were analysed and no statistically significant differences were found. Barking at print was found to be distinct from mindless reading and mind-wandering, as well as other reading types for both first and second languages. Barking is characterised by slow reading with few regressions, average fixation durations typical of second language reading, and variability in eye-movements between lines of text. This work is significant in that it establishes that eye-movement during barking at print is distinct from other categories of reading. However, further research is needed before valid applications can be made from this work

Reading Speed, Comprehension and Eye Movements While Reading Japanese Novels: Evidence from Untrained Readers and Cases of Speed-Reading Trainees

BACKGROUND: A growing body of evidence suggests that meditative training enhances perception and cognition. In Japan, the Park-Sasaki method of speed-reading involves organized visual training while forming both a relaxed and concentrated state of mind, as in meditation. The present study examined relationships between reading speed, sentence comprehension, and eye movements while reading short Japanese novels. In addition to normal untrained readers, three middle-level trainees and one high-level expert on this method were included for the two case studies. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: In Study 1, three of 17 participants were middle-level trainees on the speed-reading method. Immediately after reading each story once on a computer monitor, participants answered true or false questions regarding the content of the novel. Eye movements while reading were recorded using an eye-tracking system. Results revealed higher reading speed and lower comprehension scores in the trainees than in the untrained participants. Furthermore, eye-tracking data by untrained participants revealed multiple correlations between reading speed, accuracy and eye-movement measures, with faster readers showing shorter fixation durations and larger saccades in X than slower readers. In Study 2, participants included a high-level expert and 14 untrained students. The expert showed higher reading speed and statistically comparable, although numerically lower, comprehension scores compared with the untrained participants. During test sessions this expert moved her eyes along a nearly straight horizontal line as a first pass, without moving her eyes over the whole sentence display as did the untrained students. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: In addition to revealing correlations between speed, comprehension and eye movements in reading Japanese contemporary novels by untrained readers, we describe cases of speed-reading trainees regarding relationships between these variables. The trainees overall tended to show poor performance influenced by the speed-accuracy trade-off, although this trade-off may be reduced in the case of at least one high-level expert

Your mind wanders weakly, your mind wanders deeply: Objective measures reveal mindless reading at different levels

AbstractWhen the mind wanders, attention turns away from the external environment and cognitive processing is decoupled from perceptual information. Mind wandering is usually treated as a dichotomy (dichotomy-hypothesis), and is often measured using self-reports. Here, we propose the levels of inattention hypothesis, which postulates attentional decoupling to graded degrees at different hierarchical levels of cognitive processing. To measure graded levels of attentional decoupling during reading we introduce the sustained attention to stimulus task (SAST), which is based on psychophysics of error detection. Under experimental conditions likely to induce mind wandering, we found that subjects were less likely to notice errors that required high-level processing for their detection as opposed to errors that only required low-level processing. Eye tracking revealed that before errors were overlooked influences of high- and low-level linguistic variables on eye fixations were reduced in a graded fashion, indicating episodes of mindless reading at weak and deep levels. Individual fixation durations predicted overlooking of lexical errors 5s before they occurred. Our findings support the levels of inattention hypothesis and suggest that different levels of mindless reading can be measured behaviorally in the SAST. Using eye tracking to detect mind wandering online represents a promising approach for the development of new techniques to study mind wandering and to ameliorate its negative consequences

The Impact of Mortality Salience on Mind Wandering During Reading: A Cognitive Test of Terror Management Theory

The effects of mind wandering on normal reading have been explored recently in studies using self-paced reading (Schooler, Reichle, & Halpern, 2004) and eye tracking (Reichle, Reineberg, & Schooler, 2009). These studies demonstrate our propensity to lapse into episodes of mindless reading, but shed little light on its causality. Furthermore, behavioral studies suggest that reminders of death (mortality salience) evoke an evolutionary defense mechanism capable of embracing distractions to eliminate thoughts of death (Pysczynski, Greenberg, & Solomon, 1999). Thirty participants were primed with either reminders of their own death or reminders of a painful experience. Participants then read a neutral passage while self-reporting episodes of mind wandering and while responding to probes inquiring the status of their level of awareness. It was predicted that participants primed to be mortality salient would be caught by probes and mind wander less frequently due to increased engagement in the text in order to distract themselves from notions of their mortal vulnerability. The results partially confirm these predictions: All participants engaged in mind wandering to a comparable extent. Mortality salience-primed individuals self-reported far fewer instances of mind wandering than individuals who received a control (pain) prime, suggesting that reminders of death affect the ability to realize that mind wandering is happening

Is the mind inherently predicting? Exploring forward and backward looking in language processing

Prediction is one characteristic of the human mind. But what does it mean to say the mind is a ’prediction machine’ and inherently forward looking as is frequently claimed? In natural languages, many contexts are not easily predictable in a forward fashion. In English for example many frequent verbs do not carry unique meaning on their own, but instead rely on another word or words that follow them to become meaningful. Upon reading take a the processor often cannot easily predict walk as the next word. But the system can ‘look back’ and integrate walk more easily when it follows take a (e.g., as opposed to make|get|have a walk). In the present paper we provide further evidence for the importance of both forward and backward looking in language processing. In two self-paced reading tasks and an eye-tracking reading task, we found evidence that adult English native speakers’ sensitivity to word forward and backward conditional probability significantly explained variance in reading times over and above psycholinguistic predictors of reading latencies. We conclude that both forward and backward-looking (prediction and integration) appear to be important characteristics of language processing. Our results thus suggest that it makes just as much sense to call the mind an ’integration machine’ which is inherently backward looking

The development of an eye-tracking program to examine working memory during gameplay

In this experiment we work to examine brain activity and cognitive resources, by using a visual resource (virtual game of Mahjong) to study human working memory. Working memory is the process used to manipulate and maintain information so that the information can be used to carry out tasks (Baddeley, 1974). Many studies have shown that performance on reading comprehension, intellectual aptitude tests, general intelligence, reasoning ability factors, and even moral judgments (Daneman & Carpenter, 1980; Oberauer, Wilhelm, Schulze & Sub, 2005; Kane & Engle, 2003; Kyllonen & Christal, 1990; DeCaro, Thomas & Beilock, 2008; Moore, Clark & Kane, 2008). Furthermore, poor visual working memory, the small amount of visual information held in the mind to carry out cognitive tasks, has been connected to disorders like Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. (Castellanos & Tannock, 2002; Rapport, Alderson, Kofler, Sarver, Bolden & Sims, 2008). It is possible that cognitive differences influence individual eye movement differences. For example, differences in intelligence, speed of processing, or working memory can influence the speed and direction of the eye during tasks. Eye coordinates, or gaze information, informs visualization. Eye tracking is the process of measuring the relative motion of the eye or the point of gaze of the subject. Eye tracking technologies are used in many avenues, from camera operation to military weapon operation. In scientific research eye trackers, devices used for measuring eye positions, are used in study of the visual system. Previously research has used eye tracking to gain information on the cognitive resources of a subject. For example, tracking the eyes during a PowerPoint presentation to study correlations between information retention and the gaze of the eye (Slykhuis, Weibe, Annetta 2005). In this study I've created an eye tracking system to study the working memory and cognitive differences with the purpose of provided insight into the reasoning behind individual working memory performance differences

WORD FAMILIARITY EFFECTS IN EFL READING: AN EYE TRACKING STUDY

Do you know what happens in mind when we encounter a novel word while reading a newspaper, a paragraph or a short story? Via eye tracking technique, this study aimed to gather clues about how our mind reacts to an unknown word while we read in another language by examining word familiarity effects on eye movements during EFL reading. After a vocabulary test, eye movements of 60 EFL learners at intermediate level were recorded while they read identical sentence pairs including words with different length and frequency. The results showed that (1) total time spent on words and reanalysis times were predicted by vocabulary knowledge, (2) initial word processing was not predicted by vocabulary size (3) unfamiliar words attended more attention and required more cognitive effort than familiar words, (4) familiar words are processed in similar time spans for English as L1 and L2 but unfamiliar words cause more cognitive load in EFL. The results were discussed in comparison to L1 eye movement research in reading and were evaluated regarding EFL reading in terms of noticing hypothesis, incidental vocabulary acquisition and EFL reading instruction

The Borrowers: Researching the cognitive aspects of translation

The paper considers the interdisciplinary interaction of research on the cognitive aspects of translation. Examples of influence from linguistics, psychology, neuroscience, cognitive science, reading and writing research and language technology are given, with examples from specific sub-disciplines within each one. The breadth of borrowing by researchers in cognitive translatology is made apparent, but the minimal influence of cognitive translatology on the respective disciplines themselves is also highlighted. Suggestions for future developments are made, including ways in which the domain of cognitive translatology might exert greater influence on other disciplines