Figure 1 - uploaded by Han Zhang
Content may be subject to copyright.
Predicted and actual gaze durations in the music and the silence conditions. Left: Gaze durations predicted by individual multiple regression models. The following values were used to generate these values: Word length (raw): Short (4) and Long (10); Log frequency: HF (high frequency, 6) and LF (low frequency, 0); Sentence/Clause end 0; Novel 0. Error bars showed standard errors. Right: Actual gaze durations. Actual gaze durations of words below 10% quantile of log word frequency were plotted against word length ( 4 13). Error bars showed standard errors. This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
Source publication
The current research looked at how listening to music affects eye movements when college students read natural passages for comprehension. Two studies found that effects of music depend on both frequency of the word and dynamics of the music. Study 1 showed that lexical and linguistic features of the text remained highly robust predictors of lookin...
Contexts in source publication
Similar publications
Background: Dyslexic learners have difficulties in accurate and fluent word recognition and poor spelling and decoding abilities.
Objective: The present study investigated the use of selected behaviour modification practices to enhance reinforcement of reading abilities amongst dyslexic learners in primary schools in Kenya.
Methods: The Solomon f...
Background: Reading fluency is a major determinant of reading comprehension, but depends on moderating factors such as auditory working memory (AWM), word recognition and sentence reading skills. We investigated how word and sentence reading skills relate to reading comprehension differentially across the first six years of schooling and tested whi...
This study examines the impact of the physical instructional setting of Grade Four students' with reading difficulties in Jamaica, on the effectiveness of the Orton-Gillingham (OG) approach. Using the theoretical lens of the bio-ecological theory, this relationship is explored using a sequential transformative mixed-methods design. This comprises t...
Word recognition is one of the comprehension processing skills encapsulated by the interactive approach instruction. Word recognition skills enable readers to understand the meaning of comprehension passages by decoding the sound of new words. Learners in Vihiga County perform poorer in English language examinations than their peers in neighbouring...
Citations
... In addition, there are studies which suggest that background music may enhance the learners' emotional states by helping to regulate their valence and arousal levels during reading [1,6]. On the other hand, other studies have reported negative effects on reading comprehension when background music includes genres such as hip-hop, slow-tempo music, fast and loud music, or familiar non-lyrical music [29]. The discrepancies in these findings may be attributed to variations in musical characteristics, including loudness, tempo, structure, complexity, genre, familiarity, and whether the music contains lyrics or is purely instrumental [30]. ...
The aim of the present study was to examine the effect of background music on text comprehension using eye-tracking technology. Ten Greek undergraduate students read four texts under the following four reading conditions: preferred music, non-preferred music, café noise, and in silence. Eye movements were tracked to assess visual patterns, while reading performance and attitudes were also evaluated. The results showed that fixation measures remained stable across conditions, suggesting that early visual processing is not significantly influenced by auditory distractions. However, reading performance significantly declined under non-preferred music, highlighting its disruptive impact on cognitive processing. Participants also reported greater difficulty and fatigue in this condition, consistent with an increased cognitive load. In contrast, preferred music and silence were associated with enhanced understanding, confidence, and immersion, café noise also had a moderate but manageable effect on reading outcomes. These findings underscore the importance of tailoring reading environments to individual preferences in order to optimize reading performance and engagement. Future research studies should focus on the effects of different musical attributes, such as tempo and genre, and use more complex reading tasks, in order to better understand how auditory stimuli interact with cognitive load and visual processing.
... This explanation is echoed from previous studies on how auditory background noise affects reading. In these studies, language-related background noise (e.g., discernible speech, music with lyrics) during reading was found to hinder lexical processing compared to white noise or silence conditions, as indicated by longer gaze duration and increased re-reading (Cauchard, Cane, and Weger 2012;Hyönä and Ekholm 2016;Yan et al. 2018;Zhang et al. 2018). This finding from auditory distractions in reading is consistent with why Frequency-Flashing Text interaction is more probable than other conditions. ...
Reading online texts is often accompanied by visual distractors such as advertisements. Although previous studies have found that visual distractors are attention‐demanding, little is known about how they impact reading. Drawing on text‐based and word‐based eye‐movement measures, the current study examines how three types of ads (static image, flashing text and video) influence readers' reading comprehension and reading process. Results show that increasingly animated ads were more distracting than static ones at the text level, as evidenced by more and longer fixations, and more regressions. Moreover, the word frequency effect was stronger when reading with ads with flashing text than without ads on gaze duration and total reading time, suggesting that linguistic‐related animated ads interfere with word processing. Although visual distractors reduced their reading speed and word processing efficiency, readers managed to maintain sufficient comprehension by adopting a more mindful reading strategy, indicating how metacognition functions in complex reading situations.
... Calderwood et al. (2014) found that 59% of the college students chose to listen to music during a 3-h study session, with 21% listening for more than 90% of the time. Although several studies have demonstrated positive effects of background instrumental music on reading comprehension (Carlson et al., 2004;Khaghaninejad et al., 2016) and second language learning (Kang and Williamson, 2012), irrelevant sound from vocal music may cause auditory distraction from the task at hand (Martin et al., 1988;Furnham and Strbac, 2002;Perham and Currie, 2014;Zhang et al., 2018;Du et al., 2020). Efficient learning is extremely important for college students. ...
Numerous studies have explored the effects of background music on reading comprehension, however, little is known about how native language (L1) lyrics and second language (L2) lyrics in background music influence reading comprehension performance for college students. The present study used a mixed experimental design to examine the effects of listening habits (between-participants variable: non-listeners or listeners), music type (between-participants variable: L1 (Mandarin) pop music, L2 (English) pop music or no music) and text language (within-participants variable: L1 or L2) on reading comprehension of college students in East China. A total of 90 participants (50 females) were screened into non- listeners (n = 45) and listeners (n = 45), and then were randomly assigned to one of three groups: Mandarin pop music group (n = 30), English pop music group (n = 30) and no music group (n = 30). The results showed that reading comprehension performance was negatively affected by music with lyrics compared to the no music condition. Furthermore, Chinese/English reading comprehension was reduced more by pop music in the same language as the written texts. As expected, non-listeners were more negatively affected by music with lyrics than listeners. For both listeners and non-listeners, average reading comprehension accuracy rates were the lowest in the condition of music with native language lyrics. Overall, our research findings indicate that listening to pop music with lyrics reduces reading comprehension performance. However, listening to background music cause much less distraction if the students commonly listen to music while reading. The current study supports the duplex-mechanism account of auditory distraction.
... Previous studies have focused on the effects of background music on reading comprehension and have shown that reading comprehension can be improved using background music, such as Mozart's music and highly repetitive music (e.g., Khaghaninejad et al., 2016). In contrast, other studies have presented negative effects of background music on reading comprehension, using hip-hop music, slow-tempo music, fast and loud music and familiar non-lyrical music as background music (e.g., Zhang et al., 2018). The discrepancy between the findings of the aforementioned studies could be attributed to the differences in music style, such as loudness, tempo, form, complexity, genre, familiarity and whether the music is vocal or instrumental (e.g., Perham & Currie, 2014) and to the participants' individual differences, such as musical preferences and music expertise (e.g., Que et al., 2020). ...
... Our results are in line with those of previous studies which showed that reading comprehension is presented neither improved nor impaired while listening to music (e.g., Que et al., 2020). However, our findings do not confirm those of previous studies which have shown that reading comprehension is better achieved in the presence of music rather than in the absence of it (e.g., Du et al., 2020;Zhang et al., 2018). The discrepancy between our results and those of the latter studies could be attributed to the different methodology they used. ...
... Our results are in line with those of previous studies which showed that the participants did not have longer fixation duration while listening to preferred music as compared to silence reading (e.g., Que et al., 2020). However, our findings do not confirm those of previous studies which have shown that the participants have longer fixation duration while listening to preferred music as compared to silence reading (e.g., Du et al., 2020;Zhang et al., 2018). The discrepancy between our results and those of the latter studies could be attributed to the different kinds of music selected in each study. ...
... The non-music group was expected to achieve a better reading comprehension score than others. Reading with the influence of music makes reading comprehension less proficient (Zhang et al., 2018). The reading duration and reading speed were also predicted to differ between those groups. ...
... The readers might spend more time rereading the sentence due to the music interruption. Reading in the presence of music did make the task more challenging, as revealed by increased rereading and overall duration (Zhang et al., 2018). However, the result of this study displayed that there was no significant difference between those groups. ...
Reading performance is a crucial skill that can predict success in education. Many factors can influence reading performances, such as background music and perceiving the sentences while reading. This study explores the effects of music on screen-based reading materials among health sciences university students. One hundred twelve participants from The National University of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur Campus, participated in this study. Participants were asked to read and understand the general theme text given on the computer screen. The participants were segregated into two groups according to their preferred way of reading, either music or non-music. Then, participants in the music group randomly listened to rap or classic music (rap = 86 BPM or classic = 161 BPM) using a Sony headphone (MDR-XB450AP) while reading. The reading duration was recorded, and reading comprehension was determined by the correct answers to four questions based on the text. A webcam-based GazeRecorder software was used to measure the eye-tracking metrics (dwell time, first view time, and number of AOI views) on the area of interest (AOI). Reading speed is significantly associated with reading comprehension (rs = -0.1933, p = 0.0412). Reading duration, reading speed, and reading comprehension were not considerably different while listening to and not listening to music. The results show a similar pattern in all eye-tracking metrics. However, the reading duration while listening to rap music (2.68 ± 1.94 minutes) was significantly shorter (U = 299.5, p = 0.02642) compared to classical music (3.42 ± 1.91 minutes). Moreover, reading speed is significantly higher (U = 299.5, p = 0.02642) while listening to rap music (139.38 ± 102.96 wpm) as compared to classical music (109.47 ± 51.51 wpm). Music seems not to affect reading performance and eye-tracking metrics. Despite this, rap music can improve reading performance by reducing the reading duration and increasing reading speed.
... Nevertheless, there is no conclusive evidence that rules out the role of higher-level language processes in novelty distraction. In fact, more complex distractors such as speech and music are well known to interfere with language processing during reading (Hyönä & Ekholm, 2016;Meng et al., 2020;Yan et al., 2018;Zhang et al., 2018). Therefore, the present study sought to determine whether distraction by unexpected sounds is purely oculomotor in nature (i.e., related to the planning of eye-movements), whether it is mostly related to the lexical processing that occurs during reading, or whether it's some combination of the two. ...
Novel sounds that unexpectedly deviate from a repetitive sound sequence are well known to cause distraction. Such unexpected sounds have also been shown to cause global motor inhibition, suggesting that they trigger a neurophysiologi-cal response aimed at stopping ongoing actions. Recently, evidence from eye movements has suggested that unexpected sounds also temporarily pause the movements of the eyes during reading, though it is unclear if this effect is due to inhibition of oculomotor planning or inhibition of language processes. Here, we sought to distinguish between these two possibilities by comparing a natu-ral reading task to a letter scanning task that involves similar oculomotor de-mands to reading, but no higher level lexical processing. Participants either read sentences for comprehension or scanned letter strings of these sentences for the letter ‘o’ in three auditory conditions: silence, standard, and novel sounds. The re-sults showed that novel sounds were equally distracting in both tasks, suggesting that they generally inhibit ongoing oculomotor processes independent of lexical processing. These results suggest that novel sounds may have a global suppres-sive effect on eye- movement control.
... The potential of lyrics to cause distraction is not surprising, given that irrelevant speech is well-known to disrupt reading (e.g., Baker & Madell, 1965;Hyönä & Ekholm, 2016;Martin et al., 1988;Sörqvist et al., 2010;Yan et al., 2018). In fact, recent evidence from eye-tracking has suggested that distraction by music may show very similar eye-movement signature to that of distraction by irrelevant speech (Zhang, Miller, Cleveland, & Cortina, 2018). If the meaning of lyrics is processed in a similar way to that of speech, distraction by lyrical music would also be expected. ...
... Nevertheless, the current research clearly demonstrates that lyrics can interfere with word-level reading processes, as measured by word reading times. This is consistent with eye-tracking evidence showing distraction by irrelevant speech (Cauchard et al., 2012;Hyönä & Ekholm, 2016;Meng et al., 2020;Vasilev et al., 2019;Yan et al., 2018) and music (Zhang et al., 2018) in word fixation times, but not necessarily in comprehension (although see Johansson et al., 2012). In this sense, word reading times can sometimes be sensitive to distraction even when overall comprehension is not affected. ...
It has been suggested that listening to music during reading may be distracting, but the empirical results have remained inconclusive. One limitation of previous studies is that they have often had limited control over the number of lyrics present in the songs. We report 4 experiments that investigated whether song lyrics make music distracting. Participants read short paragraphs in a self-paced reading paradigm in three sound conditions: 1) silence; 2) lyrical songs at ∼150 words per minute; and 3) the instrumental version of the same songs. The results showed that listening to instrumental music either did not affect reading times or led to slightly faster reading times compared to silence. However, lyrical music led to an increase in reading times in three experiments. We conclude that instrumental music does not lead to distraction during reading. Song lyrics appear to be distracting, even if the observed distraction is quite mild.
... Methodologically, while previous studies on reading and BGM were mostly based on self-report measures and reading tests [3][4][5][10][11][12] , the development of eye-tracking technology provides a more objective approach with fine-grained eye movement data 13,14 . So far few studies have employed eye-tracking technology to probe how BGM impacts the reading process 10,15,16 , and even fewer delved into finer eye-movement measures such as those in lexical and post-lexical levels 16,17 . Besides reading task performance which aimed to assess how well students accomplished a reading task and included measures of passage comprehension accuracy and passage reading time, this study also examined self-reported metacognition and eye movement measures to answer the following two research questions (RQs): ...
... Methodologically, while previous studies on reading and BGM were mostly based on self-report measures and reading tests [3][4][5][10][11][12] , the development of eye-tracking technology provides a more objective approach with fine-grained eye movement data 13,14 . So far few studies have employed eye-tracking technology to probe how BGM impacts the reading process 10,15,16 , and even fewer delved into finer eye-movement measures such as those in lexical and post-lexical levels 16,17 . Besides reading task performance which aimed to assess how well students accomplished a reading task and included measures of passage comprehension accuracy and passage reading time, this study also examined self-reported metacognition and eye movement measures to answer the following two research questions (RQs): ...
... On the theoretical side, this study can further the scientific understanding of how BGM interacts with cognitive tasks in the foreground, particularly on complex cognition and oculomotor behaviors in reading tasks. On the methodological side, since reading comprehension is a cognitive process and eye movements can be used to explain/predict perceptual attention 18 , information acquisition processes 19 and information integration processes 16 , this study employed fine-grained eye movement measures to understand how students read. Fine-grained measures are advantageous in revealing different levels of cognition (e.g., first-pass fixation duration can reflect early lexical processing; regressive eye movements can reflect difficulties in post-lexical semantic integration) 13,20 . ...
Using background music (BGM) during learning is a common behavior, yet whether BGM can facilitate or hinder learning remains inconclusive and the underlying mechanism is largely an open question. This study aims to elucidate the effect of self-selected BGM on reading task for learners with different characteristics. Particularly, learners’ reading task performance, metacognition, and eye movements were examined, in relation to their personal traits including language proficiency, working memory capacity, music experience and personality. Data were collected from a between-subject experiment with 100 non-native English speakers who were randomly assigned into two groups. Those in the experimental group read English passages with music of their own choice played in the background, while those in the control group performed the same task in silence. Results showed no salient differences on passage comprehension accuracy or metacognition between the two groups. Comparisons on fine-grained eye movement measures reveal that BGM imposed heavier cognitive load on post-lexical processes but not on lexical processes. It was also revealed that students with higher English proficiency level or more frequent BGM usage in daily self-learning/reading experienced less cognitive load when reading with their BGM, whereas students with higher working memory capacity (WMC) invested more mental effort than those with lower WMC in the BGM condition. These findings further scientific understanding of how BGM interacts with cognitive tasks in the foreground, and provide practical guidance for learners and learning environment designers on making the most of BGM for instruction and learning.
... Several studies demonstrate that text comprehension is impaired by background music or noise when compared to reading in silence [12,13]. Employing an eye-tracking approach, Zhang et al. [14] confirmed this disrupting effect, showing that background music is associated with more re-reading of the text. However, not every music piece has the same impact on the reading process. ...
Numerous studies indicate that listening to music and reading are processes that interact in multiple ways. However, these interactions have rarely been explored with regard to the role of emotional mood. In this study, we first conducted two pilot experiments to assess the conveyed emotional mood of four classical music pieces and that of four narrative text excerpts. In the main experiment, participants were asked to read the texts while listening to the music and to rate their emotional state in terms of valence, arousal, and dominance. Subsequently, they rated text and music of the multisensory event in terms of the perceived mood, liking, immersion, and music-text fit. We found a mutual carry-over effect of happy and sad moods from music to text and vice versa. Against our expectations, this effect was not mediated by the valence, arousal, or dominance experienced by the subject. Moreover, we revealed a significant interaction between music mood and text mood. Texts were liked better, they were classified as of better quality, and participants felt more immersed in the text if text mood and music mood corresponded. The role of mood congruence when listening to music while reading should not be ignored and deserves further exploration.
... Similarly, visual neurons responsive to biological motion have been shown to integrate over long time periods (Neri et al., 1998) and thus activity might further be combined across fixations on different players. In contrast, there is evidence from eyetracking studies that music, and sudden changes in music, can affect visual attention (Mera and Stumpf, 2014), as shown in reading (Zhang et al., 2018). Thus, another possibility is that at key events in the musical composition, musical features directed visual attention toward the same musician, though any effects are likely to be difficult to disentangle, given the documented influence of expertise, familiarity and immediate musical goal on visual processes involved in music reading in performance (Puurtinen, 2018;Vandemoortele et al., 2018;Fink et al., 2019;Bishop et al., 2021). ...
We use functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to explore synchronized neural responses between observers of audiovisual presentation of a string quartet performance during free viewing. Audio presentation was accompanied by visual presentation of the string quartet as stick figures observed from a static viewpoint. Brain data from 18 musical novices were obtained during audiovisual presentation of a 116 s performance of the allegro of String Quartet, No. 14 in D minor by Schubert played by the ‘Quartetto di Cremona.’ These data were analyzed using intersubject correlation (ISC). Results showed extensive ISC in auditory and visual areas as well as parietal cortex, frontal cortex and subcortical areas including the medial geniculate and basal ganglia (putamen). These results from a single fixed viewpoint of multiple musicians are greater than previous reports of ISC from unstructured group activity but are broadly consistent with related research that used ISC to explore listening to music or watching solo dance. A feature analysis examining the relationship between brain activity and physical features of the auditory and visual signals yielded findings of a large proportion of activity related to auditory and visual processing, particularly in the superior temporal gyrus (STG) as well as midbrain areas. Motor areas were also involved, potentially as a result of watching motion from the stick figure display of musicians in the string quartet. These results reveal involvement of areas such as the putamen in processing complex musical performance and highlight the potential of using brief naturalistic stimuli to localize distinct brain areas and elucidate potential mechanisms underlying multisensory integration.
