Readers continuously receive parafoveal information about the upcoming word in addition to the foveal information about the currently fixated word. Previous research (Inhoff, Radach, Starr, & Greenberg, 2000) showed that the presence of a parafoveal word that was similar to the foveal word facilitated processing of the foveal word. We used the…

Eye movements were monitored in 4 experiments that explored the role of parafoveal word length in reading. The experiments employed a type of compound word where the deletion of a letter results in 2 short words (e.g., backhand, back and). The boundary technique (K. Rayner, 1975) was employed to manipulate word length information in the parafovea.…

This article presents data and theory concerning the fundamental question of how the brain achieves a balance between integrating and separating perceptual information over time. This theory was tested in the domain of word reading by examining brain responses to briefly presented words that were either new or immediate repetitions. Critically,…

Dividing attention across multiple words occasionally results in misidentifications whereby letters apparently migrate between words. Previous studies have found that letter migrations preserve within-word letter position, which has been interpreted as support for position-specific letter coding. To investigate this issue, the authors used word…

Considers whether any sort of orthographic mechanism is used by fluent readers. (Author/RK)

The functions of spaces between words in adult reading of text were investigated in three experiments. Results were consistent with a two-process theory in which filling parafoveal spaces disrupts guidance of the next eye movement and filling foveal spaces disrupts processing of the fixated word as well. (Author/RD)

Two experiments using varying duration exposures related reading skill in adults to initial encoding of location information. Results suggest that the role of perception in reading has been underestimated because emphasis has been on item perception, not perception of spatial location. (Author/CP)

Orthographic context and visual letter information were independently varied in a letter recognition task. The results contradicted the qualitative predictions of nonindependence theories of reading and are accurately described by a quantification of independence theory. (Author/CP)