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The Chinese writing system is different from English in that individual words both comprise one to four characters and are not separated by clear word boundaries (e.g., interword spaces). These differences raise the question of how readers of Chinese know where to move their eyes to support efficient lexical processing? The widely accepted default-targeting hypothesis suggests that Chinese readers direct their eyes to a small number of preferred-viewing locations (PVLs), such as the beginning or middle of upcoming words. In this article, we report two eye-movement experiments testing this hypothesis. In both experiments, participants read sentences comprising entirely two-character words, but either without (Experiment 1) or with (Experiment 2) explicit knowledge of this structure prior to their participation. The results of both experiments indicate the absence of PVLs. Simulations using implemented versions of a simple oculomotor-based hypothesis, two variants of the default-targeting hypothesis, and the hypothesis that saccade lengths are modulated as a function of estimated parafoveal-processing difficulty (i.e., dynamic-adjustment hypothesis) suggest that the latter provides the best account of saccadictargeting during Chinese reading. These results are discussed in relation to broader issues of eye-movement control during reading and how models of such must be modified to provide more accurate accounts of the reading of Chinese and other languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wang et al. (Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics, in press, 2021) reported a Landolt-C learning and scanning experiment. In a learning session, they simulated exposure frequency effects successfully by training participants to learn target Landolt-C clusters with different exposures. The rate of learning high-frequency (HF) targets were greater than that of learning low-frequency (LF) targets. In a subsequent scanning session, participants were required to scan text-like Landolt-C strings to detect whether any pre-learnt target was embedded in the strings. The Landolt-C strings were displayed under different spacing formats (i.e., spaced format, unspaced format, and unspaced shaded format). However, the simulated exposure frequency effect did not occur in the scanning session. Wang et al. argued one straightforward reason for this might be because participants failed to maintain the memory of pre-learnt target to the scanning session. In the current study, we employed the same learning and scanning paradigm to investigate whether exposure frequency would occur in a target search task by using easier learning materials – pseudoword stimuli. The learning of pseudoword stimuli was much more successful than Landolt-C stimuli. Interestingly, however, we found a very different rate of learning effect such that the rate of learning LF targets was greater than HF targets. To our surprise, we did not find any influence of exposure frequency on eye movements during scanning even when participants were able to identify pre-learnt pseudowords in strings. Learning rate effect, exposure frequency effects, and saccadic targeting during the scanning of strings under different spacing formats are discussed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whether increased foveal load causes a reduction of parafoveal processing remains equivocal. The present study examined foveal load effects on parafoveal processing in natural Chinese reading. Parafoveal preview of a single-character parafoveal target word was manipulated by using the boundary paradigm (Rayner, 1975; pseudocharacter or identity previews) under high foveal load (low-frequency pretarget word) compared with low foveal load (high-frequency pretarget word) conditions. Despite an effective manipulation of foveal processing load, we obtained no evidence of any modulatory influence on parafoveal processing in first-pass reading times. However, our results clearly showed that saccadic targeting, in relation to forward saccade length from the pretarget word and in relation to target word skipping, was influenced by foveal load and this influence occurred independent of parafoveal preview. Given the optimal experimental conditions, these results provide very strong evidence that preview benefit is not modulated by foveal lexical load during Chinese reading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the current study we investigated whether readers adjust their preferred saccade length (PSL) during reading on a trial-by-trial basis. The PSL refers to the distance between a saccade launch site and saccade target (i.e., the word center during reading) when participants neither undershoot nor overshoot this target (McConkie, Kerr, Reddix, & Zola in Vision Research, 28, 1107-1118, 1988). The tendency for saccades longer or shorter than the PSL to under or overshoot their target is referred to as the range error. Recent research by Cutter, Drieghe, and Liversedge (Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 2017) has shown that the PSL changes to be shorter when readers are presented with 30 consecutive sentences exclusively made of three-letter words, and longer when presented with 30 consecutive sentences exclusively made of five-letter words. We replicated and extended this work by this time presenting participants with these uniform sentences in an unblocked design. We found that adaptation still occurred across different sentence types despite participants only having one trial to adapt. Our analyses suggested that this effect was driven by the length of the words readers were making saccades away from, rather than the length of the words in the rest of the sentence. We propose an account of the range error in which readers use parafoveal word length information to estimate the length of a saccade between the center of two parafoveal words (termed the Centre-Based Saccade Length) prior to landing on the first of these words. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Saccadic targeting mechanisms for Chinese reading are in place early in children. • Influences of launch site and lexical familiarity are developmentally delayed. • The Chinese Reading Model is valuable for investigations of reading development. We adopted a word learning paradigm to examine whether children and adults differ in their saccade targeting strategies when learning novel words in Chinese reading. Adopting a developmental perspective, we extrapolated hypotheses pertaining to saccadic targeting and its development from the Chinese Reading Model (Li & Pollatsek, 2020). In our experiment, we embedded novel words into eight sentences, each of which provided a context for readers to form a new lexical representation. A group of children and a group of adults were required to read these sentences as their eye movements were recorded. At a basic level, we showed that decisions of initial saccadic targeting, and mechanisms responsible for computation of initial landing sites relative to launch sites are in place early in children, however, such targeting was less optimal in children than adults. Furthermore, for adults as lexical familiarity increased saccadic targeting behavior became more optimized, however, no such effects occurred in children. Mechanisms controlling initial saccadic targeting in relation to launch sites and in respect of lexical familiarity appear to operate with functional efficacy that is developmentally delayed. At a broad theoretical level, we consider our results in relation to issues associated with visually and linguistically, mediated saccadic control. More specifically, our novel findings fit neatly with our theoretical extrapolations from the CRM and suggest that its framework may be valuable for future investigations of the development of eye movement control in Chinese reading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]