ABSTRACT
People read by making a series of saccadic eye movements that bring different parts of the text into the region of clearest vision. Both the lengths of these saccades and the time between them, called fixation durations, are variable, reflecting to some degree the processing that is taking place. A number of textual and processing variables were found to affect the eye movements (McConkie, 1983; Rayner & Pollatsek, 1989); where the eyes land and the durations of the fixations also affect the reading (O’Regan, 1990; O’Regan & Jacobs, 1992; O’Regan & Lévy-Schoen, 1987). Thus, eye behavior both reflects and affects the processing taking place. The recording of eye movements provided a primary source of dependent variables for studying the processing taking place during reading because it produces a rich, continuous record of reading behavior, yet is minimally intrusive of the reading act itself (Just & Carpenter, 1987; Rayner & Pollatsek, 1989).
