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The effects of inter-letter spacing in visual-word recognition: Evidence with young normal readers and developmental dyslexics
Abstract
Recent research has demonstrated that slight increases of inter-letter spacing have a positive impact on skilled readers' recognition of visually presented words. In the present study, we examined whether this effect generalises to young normal readers and readers with developmental dyslexia, and whether increased inter-letter spacing affects the reading times and comprehension of a short text. To that end, we conducted a series of lexical decision and continuous reading experiments in which words were presented with the default settings or with a small increase in inter-letter spacing. Increased spacing produced shorter word identification times not only with adult skilled readers (Experiment 1), but also with young normal readers (Grade 2 and Grade 4 children; Experiment 2) and, even to a larger degree, with readers with dyslexia (Experiments 3 and 4). These experiments suggest that slight increases in inter-letter spacing would improve the readability of texts aimed at children, especially those with dyslexia.
... The influence of typographical attributes on dyslexia has been extensively investigated in recent years (Perea et al. 2012;Marinus et al. 2016), studies have examined factors such as inter-letter, inter-word spacing, and font type, exploring their effect on dyslexia. Nevertheless, the findings are inconsistent, and the relationship between dyslexia and typographical attributes remains unclear. ...
... For example, Zorzi et al. (2012) found that inter letter spacing improves readability for dyslexic children when sentences were presented with increased spacing compared to standard spacing. While similar findings were reported (Perea et al. 2012), other studies that evaluated the impact of increased spacing did not come to the same conclusion. For instance, Spinelli et al. (2002) found that spacing only benefits some dyslexic children when reading words. ...
... Nonetheless, they showed that only spacing plays a role in reading enhancement. These findings align with previous studies conducted on Latin languages (Perea et al. 2012;Zorzi et al. 2012;Marinus et al. 2016;Duranovic et al. 2018) and conclude that increased spacing reduces crowding and improves the reading performance of children with dyslexia. This effect was supported by deep and transparent orthographies, including English (Marinus et al. 2016;Powell andTrice 2020) andFrench (Zorzi et al. 2012), two languages with opaque writing systems. ...
: Dyslexia-friendly fronts have gained interest thanks to their potential advantages on the reading performance of dyslexic children. Most studies, however, were done on Latin-based languages, such as English. Studies investigating the reading performance of people with dyslexia in languages with different writing systems, such as Arabic, remain scarce. Arabolexia, a font developed for dyslexic Arabic speakers, has demonstrated a facilitatory effect on the reading of children with dyslexia. Yet, the features contributing to these advantages have not been empirically studied. The current study examines the elements of Arabolexia —such as letterform, spacing, and font size —that might improve reading. We compared the reading performance of dyslexic children (n=45, mean age = 11.10 years) using texts in both Arabolexia and Simplified Arabic font, a widely used standard font, under four conditions: default Arabolexia, Simplified Arabic with matched font size only, Simplified Arabic with matched spacing only, and Simplified Arabic over-all matching. The results show that Arabolexia’s advantages disappear when Simplified Arabic is adjusted to match its spacing. These findings suggest that the facilitatory effect of Arabolexia stems from its spacing parameters rather than its unique design.
... Previous research has revealed that perceptual elements of a word's letters (e.g., stimulus quality, font, penmanship style, or letter case) may influence orthographic processing (Chauncey et al., 2008;Perea et al., 2012;Qiao et al., 2010). These findings underline the complexity of letter identification during word recognition and reading, suggesting that not just the linguistic content of words but also their actual visual presentation influences their identification. ...
... Reduced spacing between letters has been shown to impair letter recognition, which is consistent with the idea that crowding interferes with the early mapping of visual features onto letter identities (Fig. 1, left panels). Instead, slight increases in spacing have produced either some small facilitation or a null effect across studies for proficient readers (Perea et al., 2012;Marinus et al., 2016;Łuniewska et al., 2022;van den Boer & Hakvoort, 2015). Finally, excessively wide spacing (e.g., +2.0 points) may disrupt the perception of words as unified entities, adversely affecting parallel orthographic processing and increasing word identification times (Dehaene et al., 2005;Korinth et al., 2020;Vinckier et al., 2011;Yu et al., 2007). ...
... First, we employed the analog procedure in behavioral experiments addressing inter-letter spacing effects. Although some studies have found this effect on sentence reading (Perea & Gomez, 2012b;Perea et al., 2016;Zorzi et al., 2012), most of them also have reported it in isolated visual word recognition paradigms (Perea et al., 2011(Perea et al., , 2012Perea & Gomez, 2012a;Slattery et al., 2016). Second, despite both previous ERP studies employing an inter-letter spacing manipulation of twice the default one for the expanded condition (Sacchi et al., 2018, based on Zorzi et al., 2012Weiss et al., 2016), we decided to use an increase of 1.5 points to avoid hindering parallel orthographic processing (Vinckier et al., 2011). ...
Previous behavioral studies have shown that inter-letter spacing affects visual word recognition and reading. While condensed spacing may hinder the early stages of letter encoding because of increased crowding effects, the impact of expanded inter-letter spacing is still unclear. To examine the electrophysiological signature of inter-letter spacing on visual word recognition, we presented words in three different inter-letter spacing conditions (default, condensed [−1.5 points] or expanded [+1.5 points]) in an event-related potentials go/no-go semantic categorization task. Our focus was on the N170, an event-related potentials component associated with the early encoding of orthographic information, which also is sensitive to crowding effects. Results revealed that the N170 amplitude reached the largest values for the condensed condition than for the default and expanded spacing conditions, which did not differ. While increased crowding impacted the early encoding of orthographic information, extra letter spacing (compared with default spacing) did not. This outcome is consistent with the Modified Receptive Field hypothesis, in which letter receptors adapt their size to cope with letter crowding. These findings reveal that reducing the space between letters more than the default spacing impairs the ability to process written words, whereas slightly expanding the space between letters does not provide any additional benefit.
... Some studies have investigated the effect of font format on reading speed and fluency in children. For example, Perea and colleagues [45] investigated whether adding slight inter-letter spacing improved word identification on a lexical decision task and a continuous reading task. They enrolled a group of typical adult readers, a group of typically developing Educ. ...
... A number of studies have found that inter-letter spacing much larger than standard spacing often hinders reading speed in adults [33,36,37]; however, this is not the case for all readers. Evidence suggests that increasing inter-letter spacing beyond standard spacing improves the speed of word identification [45] as well as reading accuracy and reading speed [49,50] in children with developmental dyslexia. People with dyslexia may be more prone to crowding effects than people without dyslexia [51][52][53][54], which may explain why individuals with dyslexia often benefit from additional spacing. ...
... This replicates previous findings as several studies have found that increasing inter-letter spacing can improve reading speed and reading comprehension accuracy in children with developmental dyslexia [49,50]. There is evidence suggesting that some children with dyslexia are more vulnerable to visual crowding effects [51][52][53][54] and that increased inter-letter spacing can increase reading speed in this population [45,49,50]. Our results align with these previous findings; however, due to the small sample size of the dyslexia group (N = 5), these results should be interpreted with caution. ...
Reading comprehension is an essential skill. It is unclear whether and to what degree typography and font personalization may impact reading comprehension in younger readers. With advancements in technology, it is now feasible to personalize digital reading formats in general technology tools, but this feature is not yet available for many educational tools. The current study aimed to investigate the effect of character width and inter-letter spacing on reading speed and comprehension. We enrolled 94 children (kindergarten–8th grade) and compared performance with six font variations on a word-level semantic decision task (Experiment 1) and a passage-level comprehension task (Experiment 2). Reading speed and comprehension were analyzed using generalized linear mixed-effects regression models. Independent samples t-tests compared speed and comprehension accuracy on personal best vs. worst font variation. A stability analysis was conducted to determine if participants had a stable personal best font variation within Experiment 1. The Experiment 1 stability analysis was statistically significant, and 58% of participants had a stable personal best font variation. Personal best font variations yielded significantly higher comprehension accuracy in both Experiments 1 and 2 and faster reading in Experiment 2. Using digital technology to personalize font may have important implications for school-aged readers.
... The stimuli could in fact either fade in a letterby-letter fashion or, alternatively, be progressively covered by a sliding occlusor. With the latter we aimed to reach a faster fading rate; (iv) to investigate whether inter-letter spacing can modulate the RAE; this question is stimulated by several works (Spinelli et al., 2002;Perea et al., 2012Perea et al., , 2016Zorzi et al., 2012;Scaltritti et al., 2019) showing that larger inter-letter spacing is effective in improving reading performance by reducing the detrimental effect of visual crowding on letter/word identification and recognition. (v) to control for the effect of mere reading exposure involved in the RAE by comparing the reading gain observed during the accelerated procedure with that obtained by reading the same amount of material without fading (non-accelerated procedure). ...
... Evidence from previous literature is mixed regarding the effects of inter-letter spacing on reading performance. While some studies have reported facilitatory effects on reading performance with larger inter-letter spacing (Spinelli et al., 2002;Perea et al., 2012Perea et al., , 2016Zorzi et al., 2012;Scaltritti et al., 2019), others have reported inhibitory effects (Van Den Boer and Hakvoort, 2015;Galliussi et al., 2020;Korinth et al., 2020). Our results showed that inter-letter spacing does not affect the RAE in adult participants with unimpaired reading abilities. ...
Introduction
Enhancing reading efficiency is of paramount importance in various academic, professional and clinical domains. Previous research, mostly from a single laboratory, has shown that externally imposed time constraints by means of text fading can enhance reading fluency in children and adults with varying reading abilities and in different languages.
Methods
In the present study, we aimed at replicating and extending previous results in Italian readers. Three experiments (N = 90) were conducted: (i) to investigate the effects of continuous fading compared to character-wise fading, (ii) to investigate the influence of enlarged inter-letter spacing on reading acceleration outcomes, and (iii) to probe whether reading gains can be reliably observed off-line (after the acceleration) by comparing accelerated reading with an analog non-accelerated procedure.
Results
Overall, results corroborate previous findings revealing that participants read 40% faster during the reading acceleration procedure, while maintaining the same accuracy levels. Continuous fading proved to be more effective than character-wise fading in enhancing reading speed, while larger inter-letter spacing did not significantly affect the reading speed gain. Albeit the non-clinical nature of our sample and its numerosity circumscribe the potential generalization, taking into account individual differences in the initial reading time, data suggests that reading acceleration leads to larger off-line speed increments with respect to non-accelerated reading.
Discussion
Taken together, these findings offer valuable insights for the future application of reading acceleration procedures as part of multisession training programs for improving reading proficiency in a diverse range of clinical and non-clinical populations.
... Moreover, using sentences of the same length and extra-large interletter spacing was found to decrease the number of errors without increasing reading speed [21]. Also, Perea et al. [23] found that young readers with dyslexia showed faster reading times and higher comprehension scores when the text had a small increase in interletter spacing relative to the default settings. Non-dyslexic children and older children had reduced effects compared to younger children with dyslexia. ...
... As found in previous studies (e.g., [21][22][23]27]), font types were confirmed to have a significant impact on readability for both children with and without reading disorders. It is immediately evident that there is no single font type giving a clear advantage in reading for children with AD. ...
Previous research has shown the importance of font type, size, and spacing to facilitate text reading in dyslexia. Great heterogeneity in the population of readers with specific learning disorders suggests that personalized parameters should be preferable compared to one-fits-all ones. A special automatized procedure was designed to select the most favorable parameters for both text visualization and text-to-speech conversion. A total of 78 primary and middle school students (29 typical readers, 49 children with atypical reading skills, either diagnosed as specific reading disorder or as special learning needs) took part in this study, which included the application of the procedure and a validation of its outcomes through a systematic comparison of the use of the personalized versus standard fonts and voices in reading and writing tests. The results show a significant advantage for the personalized parameters. Moreover, in the case of text-to-speech personalization, the advantage is significantly larger for dyslexic readers than for typical readers. These results confirm the usefulness of a personalization approach in providing support to facilitate learning in dyslexic students.
... A total of two tasks were carried out per participant: a reading comprehension task (RCT) and a lexical decision task (LDT). For the reading comprehension task, two stories published in previous literature (Perea, Panadero, Moret-Tatay, & Gómez, 2012) were selected with its correspondent reading comprehension questions. These two stories have been successfully employed with children and employed in a counterbalanced design as the one carried out in the original research. ...
... In terms of presentation, the whole text was presented in a single screen or in a single piece of paper. One text has a total of 153 Spanish words and the second one 162, with the title "The Wind" and "The Snowman" (see Perea et al., 2012). Afterwards, participants had to write in a piece of paper the answer to five questions related to each text, which were the same questions employed in the original study. ...
The transition from on-paper to on-screen reading seems to make it necessary to raise some considerations, as a greater attentional effort has been claimed for print texts than digital ones. Not surprisingly, most university students prefer this digital medium. This research aims to examine reading times by contextualizing this phenomenon into two processes: namely, word recognition and reading comprehension task on paper and on screen. Thus, two different tasks—counterbalanced into digital and print mediums—were carried out per each participant with a preference for a digital medium: a reading comprehension task (RCT) and a lexical decision task (LDT) after reading a specific story. Participants were slower reading print texts and no statistically significant differences were found in RCT accuracy. This result suggests that the task required more cognitive resources under the print medium for those with a worse comprehension performance in reading, and a more conservative pattern in digital RCT for those with a better performance.
... In fact, the excess of eye fixations and longer reading times induced by the internal visual crowding have also been observed in many laboratories during reading tests with dyslexic readers [16][17][18] and can be cancelled by simply switching to the pulsed light mode [15]. Moreover, an external crowding has previously been observed especially in children with dyslexia, which can be reduced using larger letter spacing [19][20][21]. ...
... Yet, as Reid et al. (2004) state, for many children, this is not very obvious since they sometimes see the words as a string of letters. Thus, letter and word spacing can help, and as Duranovic et al. (2018) state, in studies by Perea et al. (2012) and Zorzi et al. (2012), students with dyslexia read mostly spaced text faster than usually spaced text and made noticeably fewer mistakes. Furthermore, word spacing was identified to be more important in boosting their reading skills rather than the typeface choice, meaning that wider spacing was found to be more helpful than the letter shapes and font style (Bachmann, 2013;Bachmann & Mengheri, 2018;Duranovic et al., 2018;Zorzi et al.;. ...
This study explored the potential use of graphic design principles to support students with dyslexia in accessing Maltese language workbooks and educational material. The researcher carried out semi-structured interviews with 20 students with dyslexia in Grade 3 to Grade 6. They were presented with a Maltese workbook and an adapted version following the British Dyslexia Guidelines and other accessible graphic design guidelines. The students’ opinions and experiences were important for the subject understudy. This reflected the emancipatory principles that this study is built on. The EDP, in line with EAR, is a research model that produces knowledge to empower persons with disability to find solutions for their disabling barriers. Key findings revealed barriers students with dyslexia face when accessing information in Maltese, such as spelling and reading difficulties and limited time. Design principles, such as larger fonts, better paragraph separation, and more images, can be beneficial for students with dyslexia. Inclusive methods, such as assistive and interactive technology, typing practice, and vocabulary pre-teaching, can help students better access educational information. This study has made several recommendations, including scaffolded and adapted versions of the workbook, which would be available online and printed, with inclusive designers and publishers working closely with policymakers, schools, educators and students with dyslexia.
... Research on typeface design with children has not reached a consensus on which visual attributes are the most impactful for early readers in regard to font, line and character spacing, or text size [28]. Some studies support that increased letter spacing improves word recognition and reading performance, particularly for students with dyslexia [29,30]; however, these studies are extremely limited. Research on legibility, although also very limited, also points towards the importance of format individuation [9,19]. ...
Background: Format readability, including font and spacing, impacts reading metrics in adults, but will the research generalize to children? We examined how eight fonts (four serif and four sans serif) and three-character spacing variations influenced children’s reading comprehension and reading speed. Methods: Fifty-one students in third–fifth grade read 11 narrative text passages on a computer and answered comprehension questions. Passages were randomized in terms of order. First, the font in which the text of each passage was presented was manipulated. Then passages were presented in three spacing manipulations (narrow, normal, and wide). Results: A linear mixed effects model demonstrated that, on a group-level, passages presented in Roboto and Arial font were read significantly faster (words-per-minute) than other fonts. On the individual level, students experienced significant boosts in reading speed (words-per-minute) between their best and worst fitting font, and spacing. A chi-square test showed no one font or spacing setting that was most likely to be a students’ font fit or clash. For reading comprehension, no speed–comprehension tradeoff was observed. Conclusions: Changes to text format at the group and individual level may yield boosts in reading speed for students, without negatively impacting reading comprehension.
... This eliminates the need to superimpose two areas and allows for a close side-by-side comparison. Used for comparing bullets, cartridges, and fibres [15]. ...
Numerous types of cases are encountered all over the world in respect to handwriting and signature examination. The cases of forgery, disguise and fraudulent documents are quiet common. Forgery is usually done by person other than the genuine writer, whereas disguise is done by the same individual to conceal one’s own identity in commission of fraudulent activities. The forged handwritings varies from the genuine writing in characteristics such as writing slant, writing alignment, proportional size of letters, formation of letters, and introduction of tremrous and hesitation sub-consciously. Previous researches have proved handwriting as ‘Brain Writing’, indicating handwriting as a personal identification feature of any individual. In handwriting examination these characteristics are identified, examined and compared to prove the
authenticity of disputed handwriting or signature. Present research is conducted on the identification and examination of such characteristics on real and prepared forensic cases of disguise and forgery using specifically design “Forensic Doc scale”. The outcomes of the study have proven this innovative design as an important tool for forensic document examiner to ascertain such handwriting characteristics and provided conclusive comparison in disputed case of forgery and disguise.
Keywords: Handwriting, Signature, Forgery, Disguise, Characteristics, Forensic Doc-Scale
... Differences in crowding between dyslexic and normal readers could straightforwardly form a part of a visual explanation for differences in reading ability since stronger crowding can interfere with letter recognition when letters are surrounded by other letters (Gori & Facoetti, 2015). Conversely, reducing crowing by increasing the spacing between letters in words (Perea et al., 2012) or blurring letters (Spinelli et al., 2002;Williams & LeCluyse, 1990; but see Hogben et al., 1996) may help dyslexic readers. ...
What are the causes of dyslexia? Decades of research reflect a determined search for a single cause where a common assumption is that dyslexia is a consequence of problems with converting phonological information into lexical codes. But reading is a highly complex activity requiring many well-functioning mechanisms, and several different visual problems have been documented in dyslexic readers. We critically review evidence from various sources for the role of visual factors in dyslexia, from magnocellular dysfunction through accounts based on abnormal eye movements and attentional processing, to recent proposals that problems with high-level vision contribute to dyslexia. We believe that the role of visual problems in dyslexia has been underestimated in the literature, to the detriment of the understanding and treatment of the disorder. We propose that rather than focusing on a single core cause, the role of visual factors in dyslexia fits well with risk and resilience models that assume that several variables interact throughout prenatal and postnatal development to either promote or hinder efficient reading.
... Typographic design and layout are integral to reading as they can aid readability and legibility through the interplay of typeface selection, type size and weight, color, shape, line, and the use of space in documents (Schriver, 1997;Waller, 2012). For example, adjusting space between letters and words can impact reading speed and accuracy, particularly for readers with dyslexia (Perea et al., 2012;Zorzi et al., 2012), some of whom experience more visual crowding, which impedes 1 ...
Augmenting the visual appearance of continuous text may contribute to more inclusive and effective learning opportunities for university students with dyslexia (SwD). This neurodiverse population remains largely reliant on reading tools developed for “typical” readers. Although SwD find reading slower, more tiring, and more difficult, they are also known to use deep learning approaches, which may be assisted by inclusive, custom typographic and layout systems. While printed texts offer only one typographic presentation and make limited use of visual cues, the affordances of digital reading tools could result in multiple visual adaptations to suit individual needs, preferences, and reading strategies. This could be achieved with networked devices using artificial intelligence (AI) to read the content in texts, and by applying typography and layout modifications in response. A human-centered, ethically informed approach is required to conceptualize and design inclusive reading systems of this sort. This paper identifies and explores key ethical questions and practical implications raised by the hypothesis that incorporating AI into reading tools and visually adapting texts could facilitate more inclusive reading and learning experiences, and better meet the educational requirements of SwD.
... La tarea consistía en una tarea de comprensión lectora (TCL) sobre dos historias publicadas en estudios anteriores (Perea et al., 2012). Estas dos historias fueron pensadas para niños, ya que se pretendía que el nivel de dificultad fuera bajo, y, además, permitiera futuras comparaciones entre grupos de edad. ...
La literatura ha mostrado los efectos perjudiciales de la lectura digital frente a la tradicional impresa. No obstante, restan cuestiones subyacentes a la dificultad del texto y los perfiles de los lectores cuando estos poseen una preferencia por un texto en concreto. Esta investigación tiene como objetivo examinar los perfiles de los estudiantes Universitarios que prefieren textos digitales, en términos de tiempos de lectura, reconocimiento de palabras y comprensión lectora en soportes digitales e impresos. Se seleccionaron textos sencillos para una tarea de comprensión lectora, contrabalanceada entre soportes digitales e impresos. De este modo, se llevó a cabo un análisis por conglomerados para el desarrollo de perfiles sobre las variables anteriormente descritas.
... exemple, le graphème "b" n'est pas constitué comme le miroir du graphème "d", tel que le proposent les polices OpenDyslexic ou Sylexiad. Comme autres adaptations typographiques envisagées, l'accroissement de l'espace interlettres (Perea et al. 2012 ;Zorzi et al., 2012) et/ou celui de la taille des caractères (Bernard et al., 2003 ;Hughes & Wilkins, 2002 ;Rello & Baeza-Yates, 2013) sont susceptibles d'améliorer l'efficacité de la lecture (accroissement de la vitesse et de la précision du décodage). Concernant l'efficacité de l'usage d'adaptations typographiques de type polices d'écriture sur les compétences en lecture-compréhension, les résultats des études sont controversés (Wery & Diliberto, 2017). ...
Le présent article vise à présenter les fondements théoriques et leur transposition pragmatique et didactique qui ont permis le développement d'une plateforme numérique, GamesHub, orientée vers une conception universelle de l'apprentissage et proposant pour ce faire des fonctionnalités numériques additionnelles. Sont explicitées les bases théoriques qui visent à appréhender comment certaines difficultés à effectuer une tâche de lecture-compréhension (en français) peuvent être prises en charge par ces fonctionnalités numériques additionnelles. Ceci peut se réaliser grâce à la réduction des barrières, la diversification des ressources et la personnalisation de parcours d'enseignement/apprentissage articulés, progressifs et adaptables permettant de reproduire les phases d'une séquence didactique. Les obstacles langagiers étant au premier plan lors d'activités de lecture-compréhension, nous nous sommes centrés sur les difficultés spécifiques des élèves allophones et des élèves présentant des troubles développementaux du langage écrit (dyslexies et/ou dysorthographies). Les fonctionnalités additionnelles intégrées aux jeux de la plateforme GamesHub portent ainsi l'objectif de répondre aux besoins de chaque élève, et ainsi favoriser l'accès à l'apprentissage pour tous. Au regard des éléments théoriques développés, nous présentons chaque fonctionnalité additionnelle intégrée à GamesHub et explicitons en quoi elle peut apporter une réponse à des besoins d'apprentissage hétérogènes. Ces développements sont inscrits dans le projet européen interdisciplinaire PEAPL (Plateforme européenne pour l'apprentissage personnalisé des langues) qui vise un enseignement de la lecture-compréhension du primaire à l'université, pour tous les apprenant·e·s, dans une conception universelle de l'apprentissage.
... reduced through excessive inter-letter spacing (Perea et al., 2012) and through greater letter differentiation . However, we did not find any indication that Closed apertures had a greater negative effect on the crowded Flanked letters than on Unflanked letters, which suggests that the style of the apertures had no influence on the degree of crowding. ...
An often-repeated piece of advice when choosing fonts for great legibility is to use fonts with large counters and apertures. To identify effects of open and closed apertures on the letters ‘a’, ‘c’, ‘e’, ‘r’, ‘s’, ‘t’ and ‘f’, we ran an experiment using the serif font Pyke as stimulus. The letters in focus were designed for this experiment with three variations of open apertures (Open, Medium and Closed). The experimental paradigm was to present a letter either with or without flankers in the parafovea at 2◦ eccentricity. The findings showed that participants had more trouble identifying the letter if it was set in a font variation with closed apertures.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
This chapter discusses the increased use of screen-based reading in education and in daily life generally, noting that readers usually have the option of printing off screen-based material to be read on paper. Some existing typefaces were taken over for use in computer systems, while other serif and sans serif typefaces were developed specifically for on-screen use. The chapter discusses the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces projected using older technology such as slide projectorsSlide projectors, overhead projectorsOverhead projectors, and PowerPointPowerPoint. Finally, the chapter describes some of the technical issues concerning the way that images are displayed using cathode-ray tubesCathode-Ray Tubes (CRTs) and liquid crystal displays.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
Any differences in the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces might become more apparent in readers whose visual systems are challenged as the result of disablement. Some researchers have focused on children in special educationSpecial education. In particular, children with visual impairment might be more sensitive to typographical factors. It has been suggested that the effects of congenital visual impairmentVisual impairment, congenital might be different from those of acquired visual impairmentVisual impairment, acquired. Finally, a majority of people with aphasiaAphasia also exhibit an impairment of reading, while other people without aphasiaAphasia may exhibit the specific disorder of reading known as dyslexia.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
As novice readers, young children may be disproportionately affected by different typefaces. The use of different typefaces may also affect how readily children acquire the ability to read. Research by Burt and Kerr[aut]Kerr, J. is often cited in support of the idea that serif typefaces are more legible. Zachrisson[aut]Zachrisson, B. provided a more thorough account of the role of typographic variables in reading among children of different ages using various research methods. It has been known for more than 100 years that children tend to confuse letters that are mirror images of each other (such as p and q), and this may in principle be affected by the presence or absence of serifs. Older readers tend to suffer from visual problems which may depend on typographical factors. This is of practical importance, as in the design of labels for medication containers.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
This chapter concludes Part I by summarising and discussing the key findings. Are there any differences in the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces when they are used to generate printed material? Are there any differences in readers’ preferences and connotations between serif and sans serif typefaces when they are used to generate printed material? Where does this leave previously stated assumptions about the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces? The chapter concludes by assessing the position adopted in the latest edition of the American Psychological Association’sAmerican Psychological Association, Publication Manual Publication Manual.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
This end-piece considers lessons that can be learned from this review. Some researchers have put forward reasons why serifs might render typefaces more legible. Others have suggested that the presence or absence of serifs is a proxy for some other property of typefaces. In fact, there seems to be no difference in the legibilityLegibility of serif typefaces and sans serif typefaces either when reading from paper or when reading from screens. The most important lesson is that assertions to the effect that “everybody knows” that such-and-such” should be regarded simply as conjectures that might be subject to refutation through carefully designed research.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
AReading textreading from papernumberComprehending textreading from paper of studies have evaluated the role of typographic variables (including the presence or absence of serifs) in reading continuous text. Asking participants to read continuous text allows less scope for experimental control, and so some researchers have instead focused on participants’ comprehension of written material. Subjective impressions of the legibilityLegibility of different typefaces can be regarded as one aspect of their connotative meaningConnotative meaning, and other researchers have asked participants to evaluate typefaces on different dimensions using single rating scales or semantic differentialsSemantic differential. The chapter concludes by considering the role of such connotative variables in the legibilityLegibility of text printed in different typefaces.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
This chapter concludes Part II by summarising and discussing the key findings. Are there any differences in the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces when they are used to generate material on computer monitors or other screens? Are there any differences in readers’ preferences and connotations between serif and sans serif typefaces when they are used to generate material on computer monitors or other screens? Where does this leave previously stated assumptions about the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces on computer screens?
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
Research onComprehending textreading from screensreading textReading textreading from screens presented on computer screens has enabled investigators to use other forms of technology such as eye-tracking equipment. As with research on reading from paper, asking participants to read continuous text provides less opportunity for researchers to impose experimental control over their reading behaviour. Some researchers have instead focused on their participants’ comprehension of material. A particular device that has been investigated is the presentation of letters, words, or groups of words one at a time at the reader’s point of fixation. This was originally thought to compensate for the limitations of handheld devicesHandheld devices. It has tended to be assumed that sans serif typefaces are more legible than serif typefaces when used on handheld devicesHandheld devicesor smartphonesSmartphones. Finally, this chapter describes research on the connotations of different typefaces when presented on computer screens.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
It has been arguedContext that the context of reading is a primary determinant of the legibilityLegibility of different typefaces and the readers’ expectationsExpectations of the legibilityLegibility of what they are reading. Newspaper headlinesHeadlines have been used as a specific contextContext in which researchers have studied the legibilityLegibility and connotations of different kinds of text. Wheildon[aut]Wheildon, C. presented an extensive programme of research on the legibilityLegibility of different kinds of text. However, his research has come under extensive criticism and suffers from further issues that have not been noted in previous research. Several researchers have subsequently considered the effect of variations in typefaces and the expectationsExpectations of readers in different kinds of situations.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
The earliestLegibility research on the legibility of different typefaces was concerned with recognising individual letters and words under different conditions. The vertical “stripiness” of individual words can be defined in terms of their horizontal autocorrelationAutocorrelation, horizontal, and this seems to affect how quickly they can be read. Visual confusions among different letters were considered to be a primary determinant of legibilityLegibility. There is a separate line of research concerned with evaluating visual acuityVisual acuity, going back to the construction of optical charts in the middle of the nineteenth century.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
This chapter introduces Part I by summarising the attitudes of 20th-century typographers, who almost without exception considered that serif typefaces were easier to read than sans serif typefaces when printed on paper. In the twenty-first century, any dissenting voices have mainly come from journal editors, who have tended to recommend the use of sans serif typefaces without providing any supporting evidence. This chapter also considers but dismisses the idea that serifs are purely decorative and superfluous to the task of identifying individual letters.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
As mentioned in Chap. 8, any differences in the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces might become more apparent in readers whose visual systems are challenged as the result of disablement. Relatively few studies have been carried out into the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces by people with disabilities when the material is read on computer monitors or other screens. In principle, visual impairment can arise from a variety of causes, but research has focused on readers with dyslexia and readers with age-related macular degenerationMacular degeneration.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
As with readingLegibility from print, the earliest research on the legibilityLegibility of different typefaces when reading from screens was concerned with recognising individual letters and words under different conditions. Here, too, visual confusions were originally considered to be a primary determinant of the legibilityLegibility of serif and sans serif typefaces.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
This chapter distinguishes between typefaces and fontsFonts versus typefaces and between legibilityLegibilityand readabilityLegibility versus readability. A variety of objective methods have been developed for measuring the legibility of printed material, and many have been taken over into research on reading from screens. Researchers have also collected subjective reportsSubjective reports from participants regarding the legibilityLegibility and other properties of presented material. This chapter also describes how typographers define the size of typefacesSize of typefaces and which aspects are likely to affect the legibilityLegibility of material.
... 10.1 that the addition of serifs leads to an increase in inter-letter spacing, at least when letters are presented on screen. Perea et al. (2012) found that a small increase in interletter spacing could lead to enhanced performance when reading from computer screens, especially in children with dyslexia. Consequently, any suggestion in Rello and Baeza-Yates' results in favour of sans serif typefaces is likely to be due to the confounding of typeface with inter-letter spacing. ...
This chapter discussesInternet browsers whether serif and sans serif typefaces differ in their legibilityLegibility when saved in HTML and viewed on-screen through web browsers. This includes material saved in a local workstation as well as material retrieved from the internet. In addition to a variety of individual studies, the chapter describes a research programme that was carried out by Bernard and colleagues at Wichita State University. Further research has been carried out into the use of different typefaces for various online purposes.
... Rayner, Murphy, Henderson et Pollatsek (1989) ont également mis en évidence, en utilisant le paradigme de la fenêtre mobile, une meilleure performance des dyslexiques lorsque la fenêtre était petite et donc que l'information délivrée correspondait uniquement à l'information traitée en fovéa. La difficulté de focalisation attentionnelle chez les dyslexiques est une des hypothèses qui pourrait expliquer la grande sensibilité de cette population clinique au phénomène « d'encombrement perceptif » (Perea, Panadero, Moret-Tatay, & Gómez, 2012 ;Spinelli, De Luca, Judica, & Zoccolotti, 2002;Zorzi et al., 2012 ;voir Silva et collaborateurs, 2015, pour une interprétation différente). ...
Résumé Dans cet article nous proposons une synthèse des données disponibles sur les toutes premières étapes de la reconnaissance du mot écrit, de la prise d’information visuelle au traitement des informations orthographiques, à la lumière des résultats issus des études menées chez le lecteur expert et chez l’apprenti-lecteur. Nous examinons la façon dont les processus perceptifs et visuo-attentionnels influencent le traitement des suites de lettres à ce premier niveau de codage orthographique. Cet article permet notamment de souligner le rôle déterminant de ces processus dans l’apprentissage de la lecture, ainsi que dans la compréhension des difficultés observées chez certains enfants dyslexiques.
La universidad española incorpora cada vez a un mayor número de personas con discapacidad y con necesidades específicas de apoyo (NEA). Esta incorporación se realiza en el marco de la ley conocida como LOSU, que insta a las universidades a favorecer la inclusividad y accesibilidad en las enseñanzas universitarias. Pese a esta ley, las universidades españolas no suelen contar con los recursos humanos y económicos necesarios para afrontar convincentemente dicha inclusión. Un grupo de estudiantes con NEA especialmente numeroso es el de aquellos con dislexia. Para este estudiantado existen en muchas universidades guías y orientaciones, si bien no parecen provenir de un estudio suficientemente amplio y riguroso de la bibliografía especializada. En este trabajo realizamos una revisión profunda de la bibliografía específica sobre la atención universitaria al estudiantado con dislexia y analizamos los resultados obtenidos. Fruto de la amplia revisión bibliográfica se generan una serie de propuestas de carácter institucional y de práctica docente que tienen por objeto mejorar la inclusión y accesibilidad de los estudios universitarios al estudiantado con dislexia. Para cumplir con la legislación española en relación con la inclusión y accesibilidad del estudiantado con NEA, es necesario realizar inversiones y tomar nuevas decisiones basadas en la información que aporta la bibliografía disponible.
Araştırmada "Görsel Algılama Destekli Okuma Yazmaya Hazırlık Etkinliklerinin Yazı Farkındalığına Etkisinin İncelenmesi" amaçlanmıştır. Bu amaçla araştırmanın tasarımı, yarı deneysel öntest-son test kontrol gruplu desen olarak yapılandırılmıştır. Araştırmanın çalışma grubunu, deney (33), kontrol (33) olmak üzere toplam 66 çocuk oluşturmaktadır. Araştırmada veri toplama aracı olarak, “Kişisel Bilgi Formu” ile Şimşek Çetin ve Alisinanoğlu (2013) tarafından geliştirilen "Okul Öncesi Dönemdeki Çocukların Yazı Farkındalığını Değerlendirme Kontrol Listesi” kullanılmıştır. Okul öncesi dönemdeki çocukların yazı farkındalığı becerilerini desteklemeyi esas alan "Görsel Algı Destekli Yazı Farkındalığı Etkinlikleri", 6 hafta boyunca haftada üç gün olacak şekilde toplam 18 etkinlik olarak gerçekleştirilmiştir. Araştırmada ön-test ve son-test sonuçları arasındaki farklar, bağımsız örneklem t-testi ile değerlendirilmiştir. Ayrıca, deney grubu içinde etkinliklere katılan çocukların performansı, kontrol grubundakilerle karşılaştırmak amacıyla kendi aralarında bir t-testi uygulanmıştır. Araştırma sonucunda, etkinliklerde farklı şekil, doku, renk içeren nesnelerin kullanılmasının, el-göz koordinasyonunu geliştirmenin, benzerlik ve farklılıklara dikkat çekmenin yazı ile ilişkili harf ve sözcüklerin birbirleriyle ilişkisini ve farklılıklarını anlamak konusunda önemli bir destek sağladığı belirlenmiştir. Bu nedenle, bu tür etkinliklerin yazı farkındalığı becerilerinin gelişimine katkıda bulunduğu düşünülmektedir.
Dyslexia-friendly typefaces for the Latin script have been proliferating during the past decade. The typefaces are designed to tackle the challenges faced in a dyslexic reading experience by manipulating their letter forms and typographic attributes; several studies reported a positive effect on the reading experience. To this date, no working dyslexia-friendly Arabic typefaces are available for the public. The present study is part of a larger practice-based research, where a novel dyslexia-friendly Arabic typeface is designed using a user-centred design approach. The current visual analysis marks the developmental phase, identifying the letterform features of dyslexia-friendly Latin typefaces that can be mapped to the Arabic script. This article explores the typographic features of dyslexia-friendly Latin typefaces by conducting a qualitative visual analysis; a proposed modified version of Leeuwen’s Typographic Distinctive Features Framework is employed. The results are discussed considering the Arabic script’s visual implications in a dyslexic reading experience. The findings of this study are used to create a list of design considerations for a dyslexia-friendly Arabic typeface.
This systematic review aimed to examine the possible implication of visual-perceptual, visuo-attentional and oculomotor processing in the reading deficits frequently experienced by children with Neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1), as previously shown in dyslexia. Using PRISMA methodological guidelines, we examined 49 studies; most of these reported visual-processing deficits in this population, raising the importance of directly studying the visuo-perceptual and visuo-attentional processes and eye-movement control involved in the learning-to-read process in NF1. The discussion provides a reflection for a better understanding of how visual-processing skills interact with reading deficits in NF1, as well as new avenues for their screening and care.
Some perceptual manipulations, such as font size or bolding, can affect the estimations of future memorability (i.e., judgments of learning or JOLs). In two experiments, we studied the effect on JOLs of another perceptual manipulation: the interletter spacing. Spacing may decrease JOLs via beliefs on the effect of spacing on memory, or it may increase JOLs via feelings of processing fluency. In Experiment 1, we found that people do not hold any particular belief on the effect of spacing on memory for a list of words. In Experiment 2, we found that letter spacing did not affect JOLs. We also replicated the results that participants believe that words in large font size will be better remembered and that they rate words in large font size with higher JOLs. In sum, this research showed that not all the perceptual characteristics are used as cues to metamemory.
Recently, LexiaD, a dyslexia-specific Cyrillic font, was tested alongside the widely used Arial font in an experiment during which adolescents with and without dyslexia silently read sentences on a computer screen (Alexeeva et al., 2022). LexiaD showed a worse performance than Arial at the beginning of the experiment, but by the end of it, LexiaD demonstrated a positive effect in feature extraction and similar performance in lexical access, text integration, and global reading processing. We suggest that Arial’s initial advantage can be explained either by its familiarity or by its design features. The current study aims to test these assumptions in adolescents without dyslexia by comparing LexiaD with two popular fonts familiar to adolescents: Times New Roman and Roboto (a default font for the Google applications that is similar to Arial). Participants silently read printed versions of three texts (one in each of the three fonts) while their eye movements were recorded using a mobile eye tracker (Pupil Core glasses). In reading speed measures, Roboto outperformed LexiaD, whereas we found no evidence that Times New Roman’s performance was better than that of LexiaD. Moreover, there was no evidence that the control fonts differed in terms of subjective font familiarity. Therefore, we speculate that it was the design features that contributed the most to Arial becoming a facilitating font in the previous experiment. A study that investigates the efficiency of LexiaD, Arial/Roboto, and Times New Roman in a less experienced group (with participants less accustomed to particular fonts) is required to replicate our results. Involving people with dyslexia in future studies is extremely important.
Sommario Il rapporto del testo scritto con la dimensione spaziale è talmente palese ed evidente da diventare trasparente, invisibile. In questo senso, accettando la definizione di Ong della scrittura come tecnologia della parola, il testo scritto è certamente annoverabile tra le "tecnologie invisibili". Questo lavoro muove dalla considerazione che non tutte le tecnologie sono trasparenti allo stesso modo per tutti. Il processo di lettura/scrittura, ad esempio, continua a presentare elementi di opacità, che si rivelano in maniera drammatica nel caso di disturbi specifici di apprendimento. Il presente lavoro illustra le scelte effettuate in fase di design di un font orientato a favorire il processo di lettura in soggetti dislessici e i risultati emersi dallo studio pilota tramite cui ne è stata verificata l'efficacia. Il font realizzato, battezzato D-FONT, è composto allo stadio di sviluppo attuale da 102 glifi comprendenti lettere (minuscole e maiuscole), numeri, accenti, simboli e punteggiatura. PAROLE CHIAVE Dislessia, Lettura/Scrittura, Font, Didattica, DSA. Abstract The relationship between written text and the spatial dimension is so evident and obvious as to become practically transparent, invisible. Assuming Ong's definition of writing as a technology of the word, written text is certainly classifiable among the "invisible technologies". The work presented here is based on the consideration that not all technologies are transparent in the same way for everyone. For example, the process of reading and writing continues to present degrees of opacity that can have a dramatic impact in the case of specific learning disabilities. This paper discusses the choices made in the design of a font called D-FONT, which is geared towards making reading easier for dyslexic subjects. It also reports the results of a pilot study carried out to verify the font's effectiveness for this purpose. At its present stage of development, D-FONT consists of 102 glyphs, including upper and lowercase letters, numbers, accents, symbols and punctuation.
Whether oculomotor deficits are common in reading disorders (RD), and related to reading ability in general, has been debated for decades. Since RD are frequently comorbid with the Neurofibromatosis type1 (NF1), children with NF1 were used as a comparison group for children with dyslexia in this study. Eye movements were recorded while 21 dyslexic, 20 NF1, and 20 typically developing children performed an oculomotor lateralized bisection task. The type of stimulus - discrete (words and strings of hashes) versus continuous (solid lines) - and the stimulus presentation side (left vs. right) were manipulated. The results showed that (1) only proficient readers (TD and NF1 without RD) showed fully developed oculomotor mechanisms for efficient reading, with a clear preferred viewing location located halfway between the beginning and the middle of the word in both visual fields, and fine-tuned saccade targeting guided by the between-character space information and (2) NF1 poor readers mirrored the dyslexic eye movement behaviour, with less accurateness and more variability in saccadic programming, no sensibility to the discreteness of the stimuli, particularly in the left visual field. We concluded that disruption to oculomotor behaviour reflects the fact that many of the component processes in reading have not become automatized for children with RD, independently of NF1. This suggests that the differences in saccade targeting strategy between children with and without RD would be secondary consequences of their reduced reading experience.
With the increasing prevalence of the automobile, the transmission of information through the visual means of signage became critical owing to the safety problems that followed the growth of the highway system and the continuous increase in traffic. This paper presents a review of research on the legibility of highway signs and discusses the key studies of the legibility of typefaces used on them. It examines in particular the legibility of the Latin typefaces in English language used on US highway signs, focussing on the most significant findings on the characteristics of typefaces and the features that most affect legibility. The paper also discusses the methodological approaches used to examine legibility in conditions of driving and suggests that future research should pursue the application of findings in the field of reading research and be informed by design knowledge.
Type Tricks: User design is a reference book and user manual.
This book disseminates the author’s research into typeface legibility, offering tips on what to consider when designing for running text, skim-reading, expressive typefaces, reading from afar, micro-type, spatial graphics, and struggling readers (older age, low-vision, children, dyslexia).
The book provides readers – including designers and anyone interested in text design – with a quick, visual overview along with a comprehensive reference list.
The current study aims to test the assumption that a specially designed Cyrillic font, LexiaD, can assist adolescents with persistent reading problems and facilitate their reading experience. LexiaD was compared with the widely used Arial font. Two groups of adolescents with dyslexia (N = 34) and without dyslexia (N = 28) silently read 144 sentences from the Russian Sentence Corpus (Laurinavichyute et al., 2019), some of which were presented in LexiaD, and others in Arial, while their eye movements were recorded. LexiaD did not show the desired effect for adolescents at the beginning of the experiment: Arial outperformed it in reading speed in both participant groups. By the end of the experiment, LexiaD outperformed Arial, and although the speed of the higher-level cognitive processing (e.g., lexical access) in both fonts did not differ significantly, the feature extraction was found to be better in LexiaD than in Arial. Thus, we found some positive effect of LexiaD when participants with and without dyslexia got accustomed to it. A follow-up study with an explicit exposure session is needed to confirm this conclusion.
Recent studies have suggested that an increase of inter-letter spacing may improve reading performance of dyslexic readers by reducing visual crowding. However, these results have been difficult to replicate.
This study directly compares reading accuracy and comprehension, as well as reading speed, and number and duration of fixations of 38 dyslexic and 32 typically reading children (10–14 years old) in regular, spaced (+2,5 pt), and condensed (−1,5 pt) conditions using a natural sentence-reading paradigm.
Inter-letter spacing did not affect reading accuracy, comprehension, or speed. The lack of effects of inter-letter spacing was observed in both dyslexic and typical readers. Inter-letter spacing did not impact the number of fixations, but increased inter-letter spacing led to shorter fixations in dyslexic children. Decreased inter-letter spacing resulted in longer fixations in both groups.
These results do not support the claim that dyslexics are more influenced by crowding than age-matched controls.
The proposed multilevel framework of discourse comprehension includes the surface code, the textbase, the situation model, the genre and rhetorical structure, and the pragmatic communication level. We describe these five levels when comprehension succeeds and also when there are communication misalignments and comprehension breakdowns. A computer tool has been developed, called Coh-Metrix, that scales discourse (oral or print) on dozens of measures associated with the first four discourse levels. The measurement of these levels with an automated tool helps researchers track and better understand multilevel discourse comprehension. Two sets of analyses illustrate the utility of Coh-Metrix in discourse theory and educational practice. First, Coh-Metrix was used to measure the cohesion of the text base and situation model, as well as potential extraneous variables, in a sample of published studies that manipulated text cohesion. This analysis helped us better understand what was precisely manipulated in these studies and the implications for discourse comprehension mechanisms. Second, Coh-Metrix analyses are reported for samples of narrative and science texts in order to advance the argument that traditional text difficulty measures are limited because they fail to accommodate most of the levels of the multilevel discourse comprehension framework.
There is growing empirical evidence that shows that transposed-letter pseudowords (e.g., relovution) are perceptually very similar to their base words. This is a finding that has important implications for the choice of an input coding scheme in visual word recognition and naming. In the present experiment, we examined the presence of transposed-letter effects for pseudowords by using the naming task in a transparent orthography (Spanish): The pseudowords were created by transposing two letters or by replacing two letters (e.g., relovución vs. retosución). Since it has been suggested that transposed-letter effects may be greater for developing than for adult readers (Castles, Davis, & Forster, 2003), we recruited beginning readers (second graders, i.e., 7-year-olds), intermediate readers (fourth graders, i.e., 9-year-olds), and adult readers (college students). Results showed that developing and adult readers frequently mispronounced transposed-letter pseudowords (lexicalisations, mostly). Interestingly, the difference between the transposed-letter pseudowords and the replacement-letter pseudowords vanished when measuring the correct naming times. We examine the implications of these findings for models of visual word recognition and naming.
Three experiments were carried out to analyze the role of syllable frequency in lexical decision and naming. The results show inhibitory effects of syllable frequency in the lexical decision task for both high- and low-frequency words. In contrast, the effect of syllable frequency is facilitatory in the naming task. A post hoc analysis revealed the important role played by the number of higher frequency syllabic neighbors (words that share a syllable with the target) in the lexical decision task and the role of the frequency of the first syllable in the naming task. Experiment 3 manipulated the neighborhood syllable frequency directly by comparing words with few higher frequency syllabic neighbors and words with many higher frequency syllabic neighbors in the lexical decision task; an inhibitory neighborhood syllable frequency effect was found. The results are interpreted in terms of current models of visual word recognition and word naming. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Develops a theory of memory retrieval and shows that it applies over a range of experimental paradigms. Access to memory traces is viewed in terms of a resonance metaphor. The probe item evokes the search set on the basis of probe–memory item relatedness, just as a ringing tuning fork evokes sympathetic vibrations in other tuning forks. Evidence is accumulated in parallel from each probe–memory item comparison, and each comparison is modeled by a continuous random walk process. In item recognition, the decision process is self-terminating on matching comparisons and exhaustive on nonmatching comparisons. The mathematical model produces predictions about accuracy, mean reaction time, error latency, and reaction time distributions that are in good accord with data from 2 experiments conducted with 6 undergraduates. The theory is applied to 4 item recognition paradigms (Sternberg, prememorized list, study–test, and continuous) and to speed–accuracy paradigms; results are found to provide a basis for comparison of these paradigms. It is noted that neural network models can be interfaced to the retrieval theory with little difficulty and that semantic memory models may benefit from such a retrieval scheme. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Through the use of high- and low-frequency words of lengths 4, 5, 7, 9, and 11 letters, it is shown that the time it takes to name a word or to decide if a stimulus is a word or a nonword depends strongly on the position in the word where the eye is fixating at the moment the word appears. There is an optimal viewing position near the middle or slightly left of the middle where the time taken is shortest. For each letter of deviation from this optimal position, about 20 msec is added to lexical decision time or naming latency. The effect is present even in short 4- and 5-letter words. The effect had theoretical and methodological consequences for psycholinguistic studies of word recognition. It may be a useful new tool with which to probe models of word recognition. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This article focuses on applying the SERIOL model of orthographic processing to dyslexia. The model is extended to include a phonological route and reading acquisition. We propose that the temporal alignment of serial orthographic and phonological representations is a key aspect of learning to read, driving the formation of a phonemic encoding. The phonemic encoding and the serial representations are mutually reinforcing, leading to automatic, proficient processing of letter strings. A breakdown in any component of this system leads to the failure to form string-specific phonological and visual representations, resulting in impaired reading ability.
The importance of phonological syllables in recognition and pronunciation of
visual words has been demonstrated in languages with a high degree of spelling-sound
correspondence. In Spanish, multisyllabic words with frequent first syllables are named
more quickly than those with less frequent first syllables, but receive slower lexical
decisions. The latter effect is attributed to lexical competition from other words
beginning with the same syllable. We examined syllable frequency effects on naming and
lexical decision for 3029 visually presented words in English, a language with a high
degree of irregularity in spelling/sound relationships, and in which phonological syllables
are less clearly marked in printed words. The results showed facilitative effects of
syllable frequency in both tasks, and these were stronger when syllables were defined
orthographically than phonologically. The results suggest that activation of lexical
candidates based on a syllabic code does not occur rapidly enough to interfere with
lexical decision in English.
Investigating human cognitive faculties such as language, attention, and memory most often relies on testing small and homogeneous groups of volunteers coming to research facilities where they are asked to participate in behavioral experiments. We show that this limitation and sampling bias can be overcome by using smartphone technology to collect data in cognitive science experiments from thousands of subjects from all over the world. This mass coordinated use of smartphones creates a novel and powerful scientific "instrument" that yields the data necessary to test universal theories of cognition. This increase in power represents a potential revolution in cognitive science.
The LEXIN database offers psycholinguistic indexes of the 13,184 different words (types) computed from 178,839 occurrences of these words (tokens) contained in a corpus of 134 beginning readers widely used in Spain. This database provides four statistical indicators: F (overall word frequency), D (index of dispersion across selected readers), U (estimated frequency per million words), and SFI (standard frequency index). It also gives information about the number of letters, syntactic category, and syllabic structure of the words included. To facilitate comparisons, LEXIN provides data from LEXESP's (Sebastián-Gallés, Martí, Cuetos, & Carreiras, 2000), Alameda and Cuetos's (1995), and Martínez and García's (2004) Spanish adult psycholinguistic frequency databases. Access to the LEXIN database is facilitated by a computer program. The LEXIN program allows for the creation of word lists by letting the user specify searching criteria. LEXIN can be useful for researchers in cognitive psychology, particularly in the areas of psycholinguistics and education.
The influence of addition and deletion neighbors on visual word identification was investigated in four experiments. Experiments 1 and 2 used Spanish stimuli. In Experiment 1, lexical decision latencies were slower and less accurate for words and nonwords with higher-frequency deletion neighbors (e.g., jugar in juzgar), relative to control stimuli. Experiment 2 showed a similar interference effect for words and nonwords with higher-frequency addition neighbors (e.g., conejo, which has the addition neighbor consejo), relative to control stimuli. Experiment 3 replicated this addition neighbor interference effect in a lexical decision experiment with English stimuli. Across all three experiments, interference effects were always evident for addition/deletion neighbors with word-outer overlap, usually present for those with word-initial overlap, but never present for those with word-final overlap. Experiment 4 replicated the addition/deletion neighbor inhibitory effects in a Spanish sentence reading task in which the participants' eye movements were monitored. These findings suggest that conventional orthographic neighborhood metrics should be redefined. In addition to its methodological implications, this conclusion has significant theoretical implications for input coding schemes and the mechanisms underlying word recognition.
We tested the hypothesis that crowding effects are responsible for the reading slowness characteristic of developmental dyslexia. A total of twenty-nine Italian dyslexics and thirty-three age-matched controls participated in various parts of the study. In Experiment 1, we measured contrast thresholds for identifying letters and words as a function of stimulus duration. Thresholds were higher in dyslexics than controls for words (at a limited time exposure) but not for single letters. Adding noise to the stimuli produced comparable effects in dyslexics and controls. At the long time exposure thresholds were comparable in the two groups. In Experiment 2, we measured the spacing between a target letter and two flankers at a fixed level of performance as a function of eccentricity and size. With eccentricity, the critical spacing (CS) scaled in the control group with 0.62 proportionality (a value of b close to Bouma's law, 0.50) and with a greater proportionality (0.95) in the dyslexic group. CS was independent of size in both groups. In Experiment 3, we examined the critical print size (CPS), that is, the increase in reading rate up to a critical character size (S. T. Chung, J. S. Mansfield, & G. E. Legge, 1998). CPS of dyslexic children was greater than that of controls. Individual maximal reading speed was predicted by individual bs (from Experiment 2). The maximal reading rate achieved by dyslexics at CPS (and also for larger print sizes) was below the values observed in controls. We conclude that word analysis in dyslexics is slowed because of greater crowding effects, which limit letter identification in multi-letter arrays across the visual field. We propose that the peripheral reading of normal readers might constitute a model for dyslexic reading. The periphery model accounts for 60% of dyslexics' slowness. After compensating for crowding, the dyslexics' reading rate remains slower than that of proficient readers. This failure is discussed in terms of a developmental learning effect.
Dissecting Dyslexia and Learning
Difficulties in learning to read, despite reasonable effort and instruction, form the basis of dyslexia. Gabrieli (p. 280 ; see the cover) now reviews the latest research into the causes of dyslexia. Neuroimaging studies may give early notice of impending dyslexia, and it is hoped that early interventions may lessen the impact of dyslexia. Learning occurs in many settings. Humans uniquely use the formalized settings of schools and curriculum. Infants and children also do plenty of learning outside these settings, often intermingling social interactions. Meltzoff et al. (p. 284 ) survey the variety of learning contexts that people experience and discuss how recent advances in neuroscience and robotics are driving a new synthesis of learning.
Recent research has shown that letter identity and letter position are not integral perceptual dimensions (e.g., jugde primes judge in word-recognition experiments). Most comprehensive computational models of visual word recognition (e.g., the interactive activation model, J. L. McClelland & D. E. Rumelhart, 1981, and its successors) assume that the position of each letter within a word is perfectly encoded. Thus, these models are unable to explain the presence of effects of letter transposition (trial-trail), letter migration (beard-bread), repeated letters (moose-mouse), or subset/superset effects (faulty-faculty). The authors extend R. Ratcliff's (1981) theory of order relations for encoding of letter positions and show that the model can successfully deal with these effects. The basic assumption is that letters in the visual stimulus have distributions over positions so that the representation of one letter will extend into adjacent letter positions. To test the model, the authors conducted a series of forced-choice perceptual identification experiments. The overlap model produced very good fits to the empirical data, and even a simplified 2-parameter model was capable of producing fits for 104 observed data points with a correlation coefficient of .91.
Counterbalanced designs are ubiquitous in cognitive psychology. Researchers, however, rarely perform optimal analyses of these designs and, as a result, reduce the power of their experiments. In the context of a simple priming experiment, several idealized data sets are used to illustrate the possible costs of ignoring counterbalancing, and recommendations are made for more appropriate analyses. These recommendations apply to assessment of both reliability of effects over subjects and reliability of effects over stimulus items.
To test the effect of the frequency of orthographic "neighbors" on the identification of a printed word, two sets of words were constructed (equated on the number of neighbors, word frequency, and number of letters); in one set, the words had no higher frequency neighbors and in the other set, they had at least one higher frequency neighbor. Identification was slower for the latter set. In Experiment 1, this was indexed by longer response times in a lexical decision task. In Experiment 2, the target words were embedded in sentences, and slower identification was indexed by disruptions in reading: more regressions back to the words with higher frequency neighbors and longer fixations on the text immediately following these words. The latter results indicate that a higher frequency neighbor affects relatively late stages of lexical access, an interpretation consistent with both activation-verification and interactive activation models.
DMDX is a Windows-based program designed primarily for language-processing experiments. It uses the features of Pentium class CPUs and the library routines provided in DirectX to provide accurate timing and synchronization of visual and audio output. A brief overview of the design of the program is provided, together with the results of tests of the accuracy of timing. The Web site for downloading the software is given, but the source code is not available.
This article details a study which predicted that across a wide range of print sizes dyslexic reading would follow the same curve shape as skilled reading, with constant reading rates across large print sizes and a sharp decline in reading rates below a critical print size. It also predicted that dyslexic readers would require larger critical print sizes to attain their maximum reading speeds, following the letter position coding deficit hypothesis. Reading speed was measured across twelve print sizes ranging from Snellen equivalents of 20/12 to 20/200 letter sizes for a group of dyslexic readers in Grades 2 to 4 (aged 7 to 10 years), and for non-dyslexic readers in Grades 1 to 3 (aged 6 to 8 years). The groups were equated for word reading ability. Results confirmed that reading rate-by-print size curves followed the same two-limbed shape for dyslexic and non-dyslexic readers. Dyslexic reading curves showed higher critical print sizes and shallower reading rate-by-print size slopes below the critical print size, consistent with the hypothesis of a letter-position coding deficit. Non-dyslexic reading curves also showed a decrease of critical print size with age. A developmental lag model of dyslexic reading does not account for the results, since the regression of critical print size on maximum reading rate differed between groups.
Three eye movement experiments were conducted to examine the role of letter identity and letter position during reading. Before fixating on a target word within each sentence, readers were provided with a parafoveal preview that differed in the amount of useful letter identity and letter position information it provided. In Experiments 1 and 2, previews fell into 1 of 5 conditions: (a) identical to the target word, (b) a transposition of 2 internal letters, (c) a substitution of 2 internal letters, (d) a transposition of the 2 final letters, or (e) a substitution of the 2 final letters. In Experiment 3, the authors used a further set of conditions to explore the importance of external letter positions. The findings extend previous work and demonstrate that transposed-letter effects exist in silent reading. These experiments also indicate that letter identity information can be extracted from the parafovea outside of absolute letter position from the first 5 letters of the word to the right of fixation. Finally, the results support the notion that exterior letters play important roles in visual word recognition.
Readers of the Roman script must “unlearn” some forms of mirror generalization when processing printed stimuli (i.e., herb and herd are different words). Here we examine whether the suppression of mirror generalization is a process that affects all letters or whether it mostly affects reversible letters (i.e., b/d). Three masked priming lexical decision experiments were conducted to examine how the cognitive system processes mirror images of reversible vs. non-reversible letters embedded in Spanish words. Repetition priming effects relative to the mirror-letter condition were substantially greater when the critical letter was reversible (e.g., idea-IDEA vs. ibea-IDEA) than when the critical letter was not reversible (e.g., arena-ARENA vs. aena-ARENA), Furthermore, responses to target words were substantially slower when they were preceded by prime containing a reversible mirror-letter (e.g., ibea-IDEA) than when preceded by a control prime (ilea-IDEA). This inhibitory effect did not occur when the mirror image of the critical letter does not form a grapheme (i.e., aena-ARENA vs. aena-ARENA). Thus, the cognitive system suppresses mirror images of reversible letters – but not of non-reversible letters. We examine the implications of these findings for models of visual-word recognition.
We examined whether the effect that different non-cognitive and cognitive factors have on reading acquisition varies as a function of orthographic consistency. Canadian (n = 77) and Greek (n = 95) children attending kindergarten were examined on general cognitive ability, phonological sensitivity, and letter knowledge. The parents of the children responded to a questionnaire on home literacy activities and the teachers reported on children's task-focused behaviour. In Grades 1 and 2 the children's word decoding and reading fluency were assessed. Results indicated that direct teaching of letter names and sounds at home was associated with better letter knowledge in both languages. Task-focused behaviour and letter knowledge in kindergarten predicted significantly nonword decoding in Grade 1, but their effect was stronger in English than in Greek. This pattern was not replicated for reading fluency in Grade 2.
The aims of this study were two-fold: firstly, to establish a method of applying consistent letter spacing to documents using MS Word, and secondly, to investigate the effect of increased letter spacing on the reading speeds of readers with low vision. Tests on 14 readers with low vision showed that increased letter spacing benefited their reading speed and also reduced the critical print size of the majority of subjects tested. These findings could have a significant impact on the format of modified large print material used by low-vision readers in mainstream schools and lead to more inclusive practise in the classroom. Additionally, a simple to follow table has been produced to quantify the effect of increased letter spacing in MS Word. Although MS Word is almost universally used in mainstream schools to modify teaching resources, for low-vision readers, the method of applying letter spacing and its effect are not clear.
Examined the role of the syllable as a sublexical representational unit during visual word recognition in a shallow language (Spanish). Five experiments, with 97 undergraduates, were carried out to test the effect of the frequency of the syllables on naming latencies and lexical decision times. The orthographic redundancy hypothesis (M. S. Seidenberg, 1987, 1989) claims that the effects of syllabic structure are merely illusory and that they can be explained as effects deriving from the frequency of co-occurrence of letter patterns. The reliable effects of syllabic frequency that were found cannot be accounted by the frequency of co-occurrence of letter patterns. The implications of such findings for the dual route theory and for the PDP model proposed by M. S. Seidenberg and J. L. McClelland (see record
1990-03520-001) are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
To write a language, one must first abstract the unit to be used from the acoustic stream of speech. Writing systems based on the meaningless units, syllables and phonemes, were late developments in the history of written language. The alphabetic system, which requires abstraction of the phonemic unit of speech, was the last to appear, evolved from a syllabary and, unlike the other systems, was apparently invented only once. It might therefore be supposed that phoneme segmentation is particularly difficult and more difficult, indeed, than syllable segmentation. Speech research suggests reasons why this may be so. The present study provides direct evidence of a similar developmental ordering of syllable and phoneme segmentation abilities in the young child. By means of a task which required preschool, kindergarten, and first-grade children to tap out the number of segments in spoken utterances, it was found that, though ability in both syllable and phoneme segmentation increased with grade level, analysis into phonemes was significantly harder and perfected later than analysis into syllables. The relative difficulties of the different units of segmentation are discussed in relation to reading acquisition.
We examined the applicability of the Home Literacy Model in an orthographically transparent language (Greek). Seventy Greek children were followed from kindergarten until grade 4. In kindergarten they were tested in non-verbal intelligence, vocabulary, phonological sensitivity, rapid naming, and letter knowledge. The parents of the children also responded on a questionnaire regarding the frequency of storybook reading, the number of books at home, and the frequency of teaching letter names, sounds, and words. Reading fluency and comprehension were measured in grade 4. The results indicated that the early home literacy experience variables were related to the emergent literacy skills but did not directly predict future reading skills. Thus, the Home Literacy Model applies to consistent orthographies before any formal reading instruction takes place.Highlights► Formal literacy experiences predicted letter knowledge and phonological awareness. ► Informal literacy experiences predicted vocabulary. ► None of the home literacy activities predicted future reading. ► The HL model applies to consistent orthographies before formal reading begins.
Besides phonotactic principles, orthographies entail graphotactic rules for which the reader must convert a phonological representation on the basis of spelling adaptation rules. In the present study, the learnability of such rules will be investigated with reference to Dutch. Although Dutch orthography can be considered highly regular, there are graphotactic rules that change letter sequences in plural noun formation. In a lexical decision experiment, the acquisition and use of such rules were examined. Participants were groups of 31 children from Grade 3 and 34 children from Grade 6, and 25 adults. The results showed that both children and adults are significantly less accurate and slower in recognizing plural word forms which undergo vowel change as a consequence of pluralization. It is concluded that graphotactic rules in Dutch orthography complicate Dutch word identification from an early stage of development and continue to play a complicating role in the word identification process of adult readers. In the discussion it is shown that current models fail to fully explain the processing of graphotactic rules in visual word identification.
Nonwords created by transposing two adjacent letters (i.e., transposed-letter (TL) nonwords like jugde) are very effective at activating the lexical representation of their base words. This fact poses problems for most computational models of word recognition (e.g., the interactive-activation model and its extensions), which assume that exact letter positions are rapidly coded during the word recognition process. To examine the scope of TL similarity effects further, we asked whether TL similarity effects occur for nonwords created by exchanging two nonadjacent letters (e.g., caniso-CASINO) in three masked form priming experiments using the lexical decision task. The two nonadjacent transposed letters were consonants in Experiment 1 (e.g., caniso-CASINO), vowels in Experiment 2 (anamil-ANIMAL) and both consonants and vowels in Experiment 3. Results showed that nonadjacent TL primes produce priming effects (in comparison to orthographic controls, e.g., caviro-CASINO), however, only when the transposed letters are consonants. In a final experiment we examined latencies for nonwords created by nonadjacent transpositions of consonants versus vowels in a lexical decision task. Both types of nonwords produced longer latencies than matched controls, with consonant TL nonwords being more difficult than vowel TL nonwords. The implications of these findings for models having “position-specific” coding schemes as well as for models proposing alternative coding schemes are discussed.
Three lexical decision experiments tested the claim by M. Taft (Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 1979, 18, 21–39) that lexical access is based on a word's Basic Orthographic Syllabic Structure (BOSS). Experiment 1 failed to replicate Taft's finding that lexical decisions were faster to monomorphemic words split at their BOSS boundary than those split at their Vocalic Center Group (VCG) boundary. In Experiments 2 and 3, preview of a word's BOSS for monomorphemic words produced no faster lexical decision than preview of the initial VCG. There was therefore no evidence that the BOSS is a word's unique lexical access entry. The results of Experiment 3, which employed polymorphemic words, suggested that morphemic units are more likely to be access codes than purely orthographic units.
This study investigated how Spanish orthographic code complexities influence learning to spell. Word and pseudoword dictation tests were carried out by 208 first- to fourth-grade students. Items included the following orthographic code complexities: digraph, contextual effect, position effect, letter H, inconsistency, and stress mark. The results revealed effect of grade and type of complexity on spelling performance. The type of complexity also interacted with grade and lexical value of the type of items (word vs. pseudoword). It seems that children acquire spelling skills early in terms of phoneme–grapheme correspondence rules, but lexical knowledge develops more slowly. The importance of lexical knowledge is highlighted, as well as the need of prosodic knowledge for the stress mark.
Recent research has suggested that words presented with a slightly increased interletter spacing are identified faster than words presented with the default spacing settings (i.e.,
is faster to identify than
; see Perea, Moret-Tatay, & Gomez, 2011). To examine the nature of the effect of interletter spacing in visual-word recognition (i.e., affecting encoding processes vs. quality of information), we fitted Ratcliff’s (1978) diffusion model to a lexical decision experiment in which we manipulated a range of five interletter spacings (from condensed [–0.5] to expanded [1.5]). The results showed an effect of interletter spacing on latencies to word stimuli, which reflected a linear decreasing trend: Words presented with a more expanded interletter spacing were identified more rapidly than those with a narrower spacing. Fits from the diffusion model revealed that interletter spacing produces small changes in the encoding process rather than changes in the quality of lexical information. This finding opens a new window of opportunities to examine the role of interletter spacing in more applied settings.
Letter identification is a critical front end of the reading process. In general, conceptualizations of the identification process have emphasized arbitrary sets of distinctive features. However, a richer view of letter processing incorporates principles from the field of type design, including an emphasis on uniformities across letters within a font. The importance of uniformities is supported by a small body of research indicating that consistency of font increases letter identification efficiency. We review design concepts and the relevant literature, with the goal of stimulating further thinking about letter processing during reading.
The lexical decision task is probably the most common laboratory visual word identification task together with the naming task. In the usual setup, participants need to press the "yes" button when the stimulus is a word and the "no" button when the stimulus is not a word. A number of studies have employed this task with developing readers; however, error rates and/or response times tend to be quite high. One way to make the task easier for young readers is by employing a go/no-go procedure: "If word, press 'yes'; if not, refrain from responding." Here we conducted a lexical decision experiment that systematically compared the yes/no and go/no-go variants of the lexical decision task with developing readers (second- and fourth-grade children). Results showed that (a) error rates for words and nonwords were much lower in the go/no-go task than in the yes/no task, (b) lexical decision times were substantially faster in the go/no-go task, and (c) there was less variability in the latency data of the go/no-go task for high-frequency words. Thus, the go/no-go lexical decision task is preferable to the "standard" yes/no task when conducting experiments with developing readers.
Despite the importance of determining the effects of interletter spacing on visual-word recognition, this issue has often been neglected in the literature. The goal of the present study is to shed some light on this topic. The rationale is that a thin increase in interletter spacing, as in casino, may reduce lateral interference among internal letters without destroying a word's integrity and/or allow a more precise encoding of a word's letter positions. Here we examined whether identification times for word stimuli in a lexical decision task were faster when the target word had a slightly wider than default interletter spacing value relative to the default settings (e.g., casino vs. casino). In Experiment 1, we examined whether interletter spacing interacted with word-frequency, whereas in Experiment 2, we examined whether interletter spacing interacted with word length. Results showed that responses to words using a thin increase in interletter spacing were faster than the responses to words using the default settings-regardless of word-frequency and word length. Thus, interletter spacing plays an important role at modulating the identification of visually presented words.
The self-teaching hypothesis proposes that orthographic learning takes place via phonological decoding in meaningful texts, that is, in context. Context is proposed to be important in learning to read, especially when decoding is only partial. However, little research has directly explored this hypothesis. The current study looked at the effect of context on orthographic learning and examined whether there were different effects for novel words given regular and irregular pronunciations. Two experiments were conducted using regular and irregular novel words, respectively. Second-grade children were asked to learn eight novel words either in stories or in a list of words. The results revealed no significant effect of context for the regular items. However, in an orthographic decision task, there was a facilitatory effect of context on irregular novel word learning. The findings support the view that contextual information is important to orthographic learning, but only when the words to be learned contain irregular spelling-sound correspondences.
Visual word identification requires readers to code the identity and order of the letters in a word and match this code against previously learned codes. Current models of this lexical matching process posit context-specific letter codes in which letter representations are tied to either specific serial positions or specific local contexts (e.g., letter clusters). The spatial coding model described here adopts a different approach to letter position coding and lexical matching based on context-independent letter representations. In this model, letter position is coded dynamically, with a scheme called spatial coding. Lexical matching is achieved via a method called superposition matching, in which input codes and learned codes are matched on the basis of the relative positions of their common letters. Simulations of the model illustrate its ability to explain a broad range of results from the masked form priming literature, as well as to capture benchmark findings from the unprimed lexical decision task.
Crowding refers to impaired target recognition caused by surrounding contours. We investigated the development of crowding in central vision by comparing single-letter and crowding thresholds in groups of 5-year-olds, 8-year-olds, 11-year-olds, and adults. The task was to discriminate the orientation of a Sloan letter E. Single-letter thresholds, defined as the stroke width forming the smallest discriminable E, were worse than those of adults (0.83 arcmin) at 5 years of age (1.05 arcmin) but not at older ages (8-year-olds: 0.81 arcmin; 11-year-olds: 0.78 arcmin). The maximum distances over which crowding occurred, as measured in multiples of threshold stroke width, were smaller in adults (2.83) than in the three groups of children, who did not differ from each other (5-year-olds: 7.03; 8-year-olds: 7.84; 11-year-olds: 7.13). Thus, even 11-year-olds are more affected than adults by surrounding contours despite having single-letter acuity that has been mature for several years. The stronger influence of crowding in children may be caused by immaturities in the brain areas beyond the primary visual cortex (V1) where early visual inputs are combined and may contribute to their slower reading speed.
Accurate reading of words and text relies on reliable identification of letters in left-to-right order. Previous studies have shown that people often make letter-reversal errors when identifying strings of letters away from fixation. These errors contribute to a decline in letter identification performance away from fixation. This study tests the hypothesis that these errors are due to decreased precision (increased position noise) in the coding of letter position in the periphery. To test our hypothesis, we measured observers' performance for identifying pairs of adjacent letters presented within eight letter positions left and right of fixation. The task was to name the two letters of each pair, from left to right. Responses were scored in two ways for each letter position: (1) letters were identified correctly and in the correct position, and (2) letters were identified correctly but in the wrong position. The ratio of these two scores, when subtracted from 1, gives the empirical rate of mislocation errors. Our primary finding shows that the coding of letter position becomes increasingly imprecise with distance from fixation. A model in which the encoded position of each letter is independent and Gaussian distributed, and in which the spread of the distribution governs the precision of localizing the letter accounts for the empirical rate of mislocation errors. We also found that precision of letter position coding scales with letter size but the precision does not improve with the use of a pre-cue.
Letter position dyslexia (LPD) is a peripheral dyslexia that causes errors of letter order within words. So far, only cases of acquired LPD have been reported. This study presents selective LPD in its developmental form, via the testing of II Hebrew-speaking individuals with developmental dyslexia. The study explores the types of errors and effects on reading in this dyslexia, using a variety of tests: reading aloud, lexical decision, same-different decision, definition and letter naming. The findings indicate that individuals with developmental LPD have a deficit in the letter position encoding function of the orthographic visual analyser, which leads to underspecification of letter position within words. Letter position errors occur mainly in adjacent middle letters, when the error creates another existing word. The participants did not show an output deficit or phonemic awareness deficit. The selectivity of the deficit, causing letter position errors but no letter identity errors and no migrations between words, supports the existence of letter position encoding function as separate from letter identification and letter-to-word binding.
We compared persons with dyslexia and normal readers with respect to how well they identified letters and short strings of letters briefly presented in the peripheral visual field at the same time that a single letter was presented at the fixation point of gaze. We found that the dyslexic subjects had a markedly wider area in which correct identification occurred in the peripheral field than did the normal readers. However, the dyslexic subjects had a "masking" between letters in the foveal field and letters in the near periphery. It appears that dyslexic persons learn to read outside the foveal field and, more generally, that there are different learned strategies for task-directed vision. Among such strategies are different mutual interactions between foveal and peripheral vision.
WHEN a person reads, his eye movements consist of fixational pauses separated by quick jumps along the lines. What the eye picks up during a pause is largely unknown, as is the way in which the information from successive retinal images is integrated. Properties of the visual system, as well as the reader's knowledge of the language, must be relevant.
Word recognition thresholds and rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) reading rates for both unrelated words and meaningful sentences were examined across the visual field. Both word recognition thresholds and RSVP reading rates for unrelated words can be equated across the visual field by an increase in size scale. RSVP reading rates for meaningful sentences cannot be equated across the visual field, with the fovea demonstrating a qualitative superiority over the periphery, irrespective of scale. The results suggest that the early visual machinery which underlies word recognition is the same across the visual field apart from a change in scale, whilst the periphery is qualitatively inferior to the fovea at interpreting sentences with meaning.
Recent studies of eye movements in reading and other information processing tasks, such as music reading, typing, visual search, and scene perception, are reviewed. The major emphasis of the review is on reading as a specific example of cognitive processing. Basic topics discussed with respect to reading are (a) the characteristics of eye movements, (b) the perceptual span, (c) integration of information across saccades, (d) eye movement control, and (e) individual differences (including dyslexia). Similar topics are discussed with respect to the other tasks examined. The basic theme of the review is that eye movement data reflect moment-to-moment cognitive processes in the various tasks examined. Theoretical and practical considerations concerning the use of eye movement data are also discussed.
Crowding, the adverse spatial interaction due to proximity of adjacent letters, has been suggested as an explanation for slow reading in peripheral vision. The purpose of this study was to examine whether reading speed can be improved in normal peripheral vision by increasing the letter spacing. Also tested was whether letter spacing imposes a different limit on reading speed of small versus large print.
Six normal observers read aloud single, short sentences presented on a computer monitor, one word at a time, by rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP). Reading speeds were calculated based on the RSVP exposure durations yielding 80% correctly read words. Letters were rendered in Courier, a fixed-width font. Testing was conducted at the fovea, 5 degrees and 10 degrees in the inferior visual field. The critical print size (CPS) was first determined for each observer by measuring reading speeds for four print sizes, using the standard letter spacing (center-to-center separation of adjacent letters; standard Courier spacing: 1.16 times the width of the lowercase x). Text was then presented at 0.8 x or 1.5x CPS, and reading speed was measured for five letter spacings, ranging from 0.5 times to 2 times the standard spacing.
As expected, reading speed was highest at the fovea, decreased with eccentricity, and was faster for the larger print size. At all eccentricities and for both print sizes, reading speed increased with letter spacing, up to a critical letter spacing, and then either remained constant at the same reading speed or decreased slightly for larger letter spacings. The value of the critical letter spacing was very close to the standard letter spacing and did not depend on eccentricity or print size.
Increased letter spacing beyond the standard size, which presumably decreases the adverse effect of crowding, does not lead to an increase in reading speed in central or peripheral vision.
The effect of crowding on the identification of words was examined in normal readers and subjects with developmental dyslexia. In Experiment 1, a matching task was used. Words were presented either alone or embedded in other words. Vocal reaction times (RT) of dyslexics were slower and more sensitive to the presence of the surrounding stimuli than those of control subjects. Similar results were obtained in a control experiment using the same task for strings of symbols (isolated or crowded) instead of words. These data indicate that differences in crowding in control and dyslexic subjects arise at a pre-linguistic level. In Experiment 2, vocal RTs to word reading were measured. Two conditions putatively reducing the effect of crowding were tested: increasing inter-letter spacing and blurring. A moderate increase of inter-letter spacing produced faster vocal RTs in dyslexics, while no effect was present in normal controls. Moderate blurring of stimuli did not change dyslexics' RTs, while normal readers became slower. Group and individual results are discussed to evaluate the extent to which crowding contributes to the genesis of developmental dyslexia.
Transposed-letter (TL) nonwords (e.g., jugde) can be easily misperceived as words, a fact that is somewhat inconsistent with the letter-position-coding schemes employed by most current models of visual word recognition. To examine this issue further, we conducted four masked semantic/associative priming experiments, using a lexical decision task. In Experiment 1, the related primes could be words, TL-internal nonwords, or replacement-letter (RL) nonwords (e.g., judge, jugde, or judpe, respectively; the target would be COURT). Relative to an unrelated condition, masked TL-internal primes produced a significant semantic/associative priming effect, an effect that was only slightly smaller than the priming effect for word primes. No effect, however, was observed for RL-nonword primes. In Experiment 2, the TL-nonword primes were created by switching the two final letters of the primes (e.g., judeg). The results again showed a semantic/associative priming effect for word primes, but not for TL-final nonword primes or for RL-nonword primes. Experiment 3 replicated the associative/semantic priming effect for TL-internal nonword primes, with, again, no effect for TL-final nonword primes. Finally, Experiment 4 again failed to yield a priming effect for TL-final nonword primes. The implications of these results for the choice of a letter-position-coding scheme in visual word recognition models are discussed.
For assessing simultaneous visual processing in dyslexic and normal readers a multi-element processing task was used which required the report of a single digit of briefly presented multi-digit arrays. Dyslexic readers exhibited higher recognition thresholds on 4- and 6-digit, but not on 2-digit arrays. Individual recognition thresholds on the multi-digit arrays were associated with number of eye movements during reading. The dyslexic multi-element processing deficit was not accompanied by deficient coherent motion detection or deficient visual precedence detection and was independent from deficits in phonological awareness and rapid naming. However, only about half of the dyslexic readers exhibited a multi-element processing deficit.
This article describes a Windows program that enables users to obtain a broad range of statistics concerning the properties of word and nonword stimuli in Spanish, including word frequency, syllable frequency, bigram and biphone frequency, orthographic similarity, orthographic and phonological structure, concreteness, familiarity, imageability, valence, arousal, and age-of-acquisition measures. It is designed for use by researchers in psycholinguistics, particularly those concerned with recognition of isolated words. The program computes measures of orthographic similarity online, with respect to either a default vocabulary of 31,491 Spanish words or a vocabulary specified by the user. In addition to providing standard orthographic and phonological neighborhood measures, the program can be used to obtain information about other forms of orthographic similarity, such as transposed-letter similarity and embedded-word similarity. It is available, free of charge, from the following Web site: www.maccs.mq.edu.au/-colin/B-Pal.