Background: The ability to translate concrete manipulatives into abstract mathematical formulas can aid in the solving of mathematical word problems among students, and metacognitive prompts play a significant role in enhancing this process. Aims: Based on the concept of semantic congruence, we explored the effects of metacognitive prompts and…

Prior studies have emphasized the contribution of aberrant amygdala structure and function in social aspects of autism. However, it remains largely unknown whether amygdala dysfunction directly impairs visual attention and exploration as has been observed in people with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Here, gaze patterns were directly compared…

It seems intuitive to think that previous exposure or interaction with an environment should make it easier to search through it and, no doubt, this is true in many real-world situations. However, in a recent study, we demonstrated that previous exposure to a scene does not necessarily speed search within that scene. For instance, when observers…

Recent results from Vo and Wolfe (2012b) suggest that the application of memory to visual search may be task specific: Previous experience searching for an object facilitated later search for that object, but object information acquired during a different task did not appear to transfer to search. The latter inference depended on evidence that a…

Cantonese shape classifiers encode perceptual information that is characteristic of their associated nouns, although certain nouns are exceptional. For example, the classifier "tiu" occurs primarily with nouns for long-narrow-flexible objects (e.g., scarves, snakes, and ropes) and also occurs with the noun for a (short, rigid) key. In 3…

When young adults carry out visual search, distractors that are semantically related, rather than unrelated, to targets can disrupt target selection (see [Belke et al., 2008] and [Moores et al., 2003]). This effect is apparent on the first eye movements in search, suggesting that attention is sometimes captured by related distractors. Here we…

Readers acquire information outside the current eye fixation. Previous research indicates that having only the fixated word available slows reading, but when the next word is visible, reading is almost as fast as when the whole line is seen. Parafoveal-on-foveal effects are interpreted to reflect that the characteristics of a parafoveal word can…

We compared the primacy of affective versus semantic categorization by using forced-choice saccadic and manual response tasks. Participants viewed paired emotional and neutral scenes involving humans or animals flashed rapidly in extrafoveal vision. Participants were instructed to categorize the targets by saccading toward the location occupied by…

When two visual targets, Target 1 (T1) and Target 2 (T2), are presented among a rapid sequence of distractors, processing of T1 produces an attentional blink. Typically, processing of T2 is markedly impaired, except when T1 and T2 are adjacent (Lag 1 sparing). However, if a shift of task set--a change in task requirements from T1 to T2--occurs,…

Do the viewpoint costs incurred when naming rotated familiar objects arise during initial identification or during consolidation? To answer this question we employed an attentional blink (AB) task where two target objects appeared amongst a rapid stream of distractor objects. Our assumption was that while both targets and distractors undergo…

Semantic influences on attention during the 1st fixation on a scene were explored in 3 experiments. Subjects viewed briefly presented scenes; following scene presentation, a spatial probe was presented at the location of an object whose identity was consistent or inconsistent with the scene category. Responses to the probe served as an index of…

Two experiments explore the activation of semantic information during spoken word recognition. Experiment 1 shows that as the name of an object unfolds (e.g., lock), eye movements are drawn to pictorial representations of both the named object and semantically related objects (e.g., key). Experiment 2 shows that objects semantically related to an…

THE VARIOUS PROCESSES AND CONTROLS INVOLVED IN THE VARIATION OF EYE MOVEMENTS ACCORDING TO READING MATERIAL ARE DISCUSSED. RELEVANT RESEARCH LITERATURE IS CITED, AND AREAS REQUIRING ADDITIONAL RESEARCH ARE OUTLINED. LANGUAGE TEXT CONTROL AND THE CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM AS POSSIBLE LOCI OF CONTROL FOR EYE MOVEMENTS ARE EXPLORED. EVIDENCE SUPPORTING…

The authors investigated whether emotional pictorial stimuli are especially likely to be processed in parafoveal vision. Pairs of emotional and neutral visual scenes were presented parafoveally (2.1[degrees] or 2.5[degrees] of visual angle from a central fixation point) for 150-3,000 ms, followed by an immediate recognition test (500-ms delay).…

Designed to assist educators in making a more knowledgeable selection of reading methods and techniques, this paper integrates the findings of eye processing research with classroom reading practices. Following a review of eye movement and visual processing research, the paper presents a discussion of research on the process by which a reader…