The dynamics of eye movements and attention during reading

Abstract

Differences between languages and how they are written give us unique opportunities to address three controversial issues in eye-movement control during reading. The three issues are (1) whether the predictability of the next word influences fixation durations before the eye gets to the word; (2) whether we can get the meaning of words before we look at them; and (3) whether information other than initial letters and word length of the next word influence where we send the eyes. Eye movements collected from reading German, English, Spanish, Chinese (both simplified and traditional), and Uighur suggest affirmative answers to these questions.

Bio

Reinhold Kliegl is professor of experimental psychology at the University of Potsdam in Germany. His research focuses on how the dynamics of language-related, perceptual, and oculomotor processes subserve attentional control, using reading, spatial attention, and working memory tasks as experimental venues. He also examines neural correlates and age-related differences in these processes. His research has been carried out in interdisciplinary projects with colleagues from linguistics as well as from theoretical physics and mathematics.

In addition to his Distinguished Lecture, Dr. Kliegl will offer an intermediate level workshop on Linear Mixed Models, using R.