Asymmetry of the perceptual span in reading
Bulletin of the Psychonomic SocietyPublished 1 November 1976Open access
George W. McConkie, Keith Rayner
Citations368
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Abstract
An on-line computer technique was used to determine whether three skilled readers acquired visual information equally far to the left and right of central vision during fixations in reading. None of the subjects appeared to use visual information more than four character positions to the left of the fixation point (smaller distances were not tested), though all of them acquired visual information substantially further than that to the right. Thus, the region of useful visual information in reading is asymmetric around the fixation point.
Keywords
Neuroscience
Perception & PsychophysicsThe span of the effective stimulus during a fixation in reading
1,268 Citations1975George W. McConkie, Keith Rayner
A computer-based eye-movement controlled, display system was developed for the study of perceptual processes in reading and results indicated that the subjects acquired word-length pattern information at least 12 to 15 character positions to the right of the fixation point, and that this information primarily influenced saccade lengths.
Cognitive PsychologyThe perceptual span and peripheral cues in reading
1,106 Citations1975Keith Rayner
It was found that a reader was able to make a semantic interpretation of a word that began 1–6 character spaces from his fixation point, and the size of the area from which he does is rather small, suggesting that the skilled reader is able to take advantage of information in the periphery.
Vision ResearchVisual interference in the parafoveal recognition of initial and final letters of words
483 Citations1973H. Bouma
Letter counts are higher in words than in letter strings, which reveals a strong adverse interaction mainly acting towards the fovea, in particular for long stimuli.
Vision ResearchVisual recognition of isolated lower-case letters
234 Citations1971H. Bouma
Perceptual cues prevail over bias effects in eccentric vision, and bias effects occur towards letters that occur frequently in the printed language, but they are restricted to confusions.
Behavior Research Methods & InstrumentationOn-line monitoring of eye-position signals in contingent and noncontingent paradigms
67 Citations1973Stephen Reder
This paper presents a research methodology for the study of human attentional and perceptual processes by means of on-line monitoring of eye-position signals, appropriate to a variety of studies in which eye movements are considered to be part of an attentional control system.