Aging and the optimal viewing position effect in Chinese

Abstract

Substantial evidence indicates that where readers fixate within a word affects the efficiency with which that word is recognized. Indeed, words in alphabetic languages (e.g., English, French) are recognized most efficiently when fixated at their optimal viewing position (OVP), which is near the word center. However, little is known about the effects of fixation location on word recognition in non-alphabetic languages, such as Chinese. Moreover, studies to date have not investigated if effects of fixation location vary across adult age-groups, although it is well-established that older readers experience greater difficulty recognizing words due to visual and cognitive declines. Accordingly, the present research examined OVP effects by young and older adult readers when recognizing Chinese words presented in isolation. Most words in Chinese are formed from two or more logograms called characters and so the present experiment investigated the influence of fixation location on the recognition of 2-, 3-, and 4-character words (and nonwords). The older adults experienced generally greater word recognition difficulty. But whereas the young adults recognized words most efficiently when initially fixating the first character of 2-character words and second character of 3- and 4-character words, the older adults recognized words most efficiently when initially fixating the first character for words of each length. The findings therefore reveal subtle but potentially important adult age differences in the effects of fixation location on Chinese word recognition. Moreover, the similarity in effects for words and nonwords implies a more general age-related change in oculomotor strategy when processing Chinese character-strings.

The effects of spaces on word segmentation in Chinese reading: Evidence from eye movements

“…Importantly, the present study ruled out the possibility that the different effects of inserting a space before and after a word are caused by landing position effects. The results that gaze duration was longer when the eyes fixated on the first character than on the second character within a word in the space after the word condition are completely inconsistent with the OVP effects (P. Liu & Li, ; P. Liu et al, ). The present results may be due to information density because there was a space after the second character within a word.…”

“…The study by P. Liu and Li () reported that readers initially tended to fixate on the first character (e.g., 呼 ) in the space after word condition (e.g., 呼 吁 ) and on the second character (e.g., 吁 ) in the space before word condition (e.g., 呼 吁 ). Previous studies of optimal viewing position (OVP) have also indicated that Chinese word recognition is most efficient when the eyes fixate more on the first character (i.e., OVP) than on the second character of a two‐character for both words and nonwords (P. Liu & Li, ; P. Liu, Liu, Han & Paterson, ). Therefore, the shorter reading time in the space after compared with the space before condition might be explained by initial fixations being more likely to be located at the OVP in the space after word condition.…”

Effects of adults aging on word encoding in reading Chinese: evidence from disappearing text

“…This adds to the growing evidence that old readers suffer from greater reading difficulties (Kemper, Crow & Kemtes, 2004; Kliegl et al, 2004; Stine-Morrow, Miller & Herzog, 2006; Rayner et al, 2006; Rayner, Castelhano & Yang, 2009; Laubrock, Kliegl & Engbert, 2006). We also found some age changes that are specific of Chinese, that is, compared to reading alphabetic languages such as English and German, old adults reading Chinese employ a more cautious eye movement strategy (i.e., they skip words less frequently), which is consistent with previous studies (Liu et al, 2015; Wang et al, 2016; Zang et al, 2016). These researchers proposed that increased difficulty in processing word boundary in the preview phase with age causes older adult readers to use a more careful reading strategy to compensate for this difficulty.…”

Peer Review #2 of "Effects of adults aging on word encoding in reading Chinese: evidence from disappearing text (v0.2)"

“…This adds to the growing evidence that old readers suffer from greater reading difficulties (Kemper et al, 2004;Kliegl et al, 2004;Stine-Morrow et al, 2006;Rayner et al, 2006Rayner et al, , 2009Laubrock et al, 2006). We also found some age changes that are specific of Chinese, that is, compared to reading alphabetic languages such as English and German, old adults reading Chinese employ a more cautious eye movement strategy (i.e., they skip words less frequently), which is consistent with previous studies (Liu, Liu, Han, & Paterson, 2015;Wang et al, 2016;Zang et al, 2016). These researchers proposed that increased difficulty in processing word boundary in the preview phase with age causes older adult readers to use a more careful reading strategy to compensate for this difficulty.…”