Using Eye Movements to Investigate Word Frequency Effects in Children's Sentence Reading

Portions of these data were presented at the 2011 meeting of the European Conference on Eye Movements in Marseilles, France. This research was supported by an Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) postdoctoral fellowship (PTA-026–27-1912) to the first author, an ESRC grant (RES-000–22-4652) to the first and second authors, and ESRC grants (RES-000–22-4128 and ES/I032398/1) to the third author. The authors thank the parents and children who took part in this experiment as unpaid volunteers.

Abstract.

Although eye movements have been used widely to investigate how skilled adult readers process written language, relatively little research has used this methodology with children. This is unfortunate as, as we discuss here, eye-movement studies have significant potential to inform our understanding of children's reading development. We consider some of the empirical and theoretical issues that arise when using this methodology with children, illustrating our points with data from an experiment examining word frequency effects in 8-year-old children's sentence reading. Children showed significantly longer gaze durations to low- than high-frequency words, demonstrating that linguistic characteristics of text drive children's eye movements as they read. We discuss these findings within the broader context of how eye-movement studies can inform our understanding of children's reading, and can assist with the development of appropriately targeted interventions to support children as they learn to read.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Holly S. S. L. Joseph

Holly S. S. L. Joseph is a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Oxford. Her research interests lie in children's reading—in particular, how they understand what they are reading and how this manifests itself in their eye movements. She completed her doctorate at the University of Durham in 2008, which used eye-movement methodology to investigate how typically developing children differ from adults in their online processing of written language. She is currently conducting a research project in collaboration with Kate Nation, investigating reading behavior in children with comprehension difficulties. Further information about her research and publications can be found at http://lcd.psy.ox.ac.uk/people/holly-joseph

Kate Nation

Kate Nation is a professor of experimental psychology at the University of Oxford, and a fellow of St. John's College, Oxford. Her research is concerned with the development of language, literacy, and cognition. She is interested in the relationship between spoken language and written language, with a particular focus on understanding reading comprehension in both typical development and in children who have difficulties with comprehension. Further information about her research and publications can be found at http://lcd.psy.ox.ac.uk/people/kate-nation. She was awarded the British Psychological Society's Spearman Medal in 2000 in recognition of published work of outstanding scientific merit. In 2005, she received the Prize Lecture Award from the Experimental Psychology Society in recognition of distinguished research achievement by experimental psychologists at an early stage in their career. She is on the editorial board of the Scientific Studies of Reading and is an associate editor at the Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology.

Simon P. Liversedge

Simon Liversedge is a professor of experimental psychology at the Centre for Vision and Cognition at the University of Southampton. He has used eye-movement recording techniques to investigate a variety of linguistic and visual influences during reading, binocular coordination during reading, and oculomotor control in children and dyslexic readers. Further information about his research and publications can be found at http://www.southampton.ac.uk/psychology/about/staff/spl1.page