A preview of this full-text is provided by American Psychological Association.
Content available from Psychological Bulletin
This content is subject to copyright. Terms and conditions apply.
Psychological
Bulletin
1998, Vol. 124,
No. 3,
372-422
Copyright
1998
by the
Americi
i
Psychological Association, Inc.
0033-2909/98/$3.00
Eye
Movements
in
Reading
and
Information
Processing:
20
Years
of
Research
Keith
Rayner
University
of
Massachusetts
at
Amherst
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.
Many
studies using
eye
movements
to
investigate cognitive
processes have appeared over
the
past
20
years.
In an
earlier
review,
I
(Rayner,
1978b)
argued that since
the
mid-1970s
we
have
been
in a
third
era of eye
movement
research
and
that
the
success
of
research
in the
current
era
would depend
on the
ingenuity
of
researchers
in
designing interesting
and
informative
studies.
It
would
appear
from
the
vast number
of
studies using
eye
movement data over
the
past
20
years that research
in
this
third
era is
fulfilling
the
promise inherent
in
using
eye
movement
behavior
to
infer
cognitive
processes.
The first era of eye
move-
ment
research extended
from
Javal's initial observations con-
cerning
the
role
of eye
movements
in reading in
1879
(see
Huey,
1908)
up
until about 1920. During this era, many basic
facts
about
eye
movements were discovered. Issues such
as
saccadic
suppression
(the
fact that
we do not
perceive information during
an
eye
movement),
saccade latency (the time that
it
takes
to
initiate
an eye
movement),
and the
size
of the
perceptual span
(the region
of
effective
vision) were
of
concern
in
this
era.
The
second era, which coincided with
the
behaviorist
movement
in
experimental psychology, tended
to
have
a
more applied
focus,
and
little
research
was
undertaken with
eye
movements
to
infer
cognitive
processes.
Although classic work
by
Tinker
(1946)
on
reading
and by
Buswell
(1935)
on
scene
perception
was
carried
out
during this era,
in retrospect,
most
of the
work seems
to
have
focused
on the eye
movements
per se
(or
on
surface
aspects
of the
task
being
investigated).
Tinker's (1958)
final
review ended
on the
rather pessimistic note that almost
every-
Preparation
of
this
article
was
supported
by a
Research
Scientist
Award
from
the
National
Institute
of
Mental
Health
(MH01255)
and by
Grants
HD
17246
and
HD
26765
from
the
National
Institutes
of
Health.
Thanks
are
extended
to Ken
Ciuffreda,
Charles
Clifton,
David
Irwin,
and
Alexander
Pollatsek
for
their
helpful
comments
on
prior
versions
of
this
article.
Correspondence
concerning
this
article
should
be
addressed
to
Keith
Rayner,
Department
of
Psychology,
University
of
Massachusetts,
Am-
herst,
Massachusetts
01003.
Electronic
mail
may be
sent
to
rayner@
psych.umass.edu.
thing that could
be
learned about reading
from
eye
movements
(given
the
technology
at the
time)
had
been discovered. Perhaps
that opinion
was
widely
held,
because between
the
late
1950s
and
the
mid-1970s
little research
with
eye
movements
was
undertaken.
The
third
era of eye
movement
research
began
in the
mid-
1970s
and has
been marked
by
improvements
in eye
movement
recording
systems that have allowed measurements
to be
more
accurate
and
more easily obtained.
It is
beyond
the
scope
of the
present review
to
detail
all of the
technological advancements
that have been made. Numerous works have dealt
with
methods
of
analyzing
eye
movement data (see
Kliegl
&
Olson, 1981;
Pillalamarri,
Barnette,
Birkmire,
&
Karsh,
1993; Scinto
&
Bar-
nette,
1986),
and
much
has
been learned about
the
characteris-
tics
of
various eye-tracking systems
(see
Deubel
&
Bridgeman,
1995a,
1995b;
Mullet
Cavegn, d'Ydewalle,
&
Groner,
1993).
More important,
the era has
yielded tremendous technological
advances that have made
it
possible
to
interface laboratory com-
puters
with
eye-tracking systems
so
that large amounts
of
data
can
be
collected
and
analyzed.
These
technological advances
have
also
allowed
for
innovative techniques
to be
developed
in
which
the
visual
display
is
changed contingent
on the eye
posi-
tion.
In the
eye-contingent
display
change paradigm (McCon-
kie,
1997;
McConkie
&
Rayner, 1975;
Rayner,
1975b; Reder,
1973),
eye
movements
are
monitored,
and
changes
are
made
in
the
visual display that
the
reader
is
looking
at,
contingent
on
when
the
eyes move
(or at
some other critical point
in the
fixation).
Finally,
the
development
of
general theories
of
lan-
guage processing
has
made
it
possible
to use eye
movement
records
for a
critical examination
of the
cognitive processes
underlying
reading.
In
the
present
article,
recent studies
of eye
movements
in
reading
and
other
information
processing tasks
are
examined.
Since
the
last
review
in
this
journal
(Rayner,
1978b), there have
been
many reviews
of eye
movement research
(Kennedy,
1987;
LeVy-Schoen
&
O'Regan, 1979; O'Regan, 1990; Pollatsek,
1993; Rayner, 1984, 1993, 1995, 1997; Rayner
&
Pollatsek,
1987, 1992;
O.
Underwood, 1985). However, none
of
them
are
372
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
