Parafoveal Processing of Vowel Contexts: Evidence from Eye Movements

Jane Ashby1, Rebecca Treiman2, Brett Kessler2, & Keith Rayner1

1University of Massachusetts at Amherst 2Washington University in St. Louis

ashby@psych.umass.edu

Research QuestionsWhen and how do readers assign vowel sounds during silent reading?

Do consonant codas provide a biasing context that facilitates vowel identification during silent reading?

Do readers process that biasing context parafoveally?

Previous ResearchKessler & Treiman (2001)

Statistical studies of written English established that the pronunciation of some vowels is conditioned by the following consonant. For example, the pronunciation of the ambiguous vowel (oo) is conditioned by the coda consonant, such that -ook is usually pronounced as in cook while -oon is pronounced as in spoon.

Treiman & Kessler (2003)

When reading nonwords aloud, adult readers took advantage of certain vowel-coda patterns. The coda consonants influenced the pronunciation of the vowels in these cases.

Goal & PredictionsTo investigate whether readers use rime information available in the parafovea to assign vowel sounds to orthographically ambiguous vowels.

Prediction:

If coda information is used early in word recognition to resolve vowel ambiguity, then words will be read faster when preceded by a rime preview that matches the vowel sound of the target word than by a rime preview that does not match the vowel sound.

Materials

32 Target Words (mean frequency = 68 per million)

Four Groups of Previews

ook / oon ort / omp all/aff ead / ean

Design Each target was preceded by a nonword preview that either matched or mismatched the vowel sound of the prime. Targets were embedded in sentence contexts.

ConclusionsCoda information was processed parafoveally, and it provided an orthographic context that biased readers to assign a particular vowel phoneme.

Consonant and vowel information appears to be integrated early in word recognition. It is preserved during the saccade to the target, and influences the phonological representation that is constructed during lexical access.

Methods & Materials36 participants read silently while their eye movements were monitored using a Generation V Dual Purkinje eyetracker.

Results

First Fixation (ms)

274

287

250

260

270

280

290

300

MatchMismatch

Gaze Duration (ms)

297

308

260

270

280

290

300

310

MatchMismatch

Data Analyses

Data were excluded from the analyses if the fixation prior to landing in the target region was more than 7 characters away from the beginning of target word.

Preview type (match or mismatch) was treated as a within factor in both the participants and items analyses.

Summary of Results: Main Effects of Preview

Effect Size t1 t2

First Fixation 13 ms 2.40 1.69

Gaze Duration 12 ms 1.88 . 2.06

Rayner (1975)

A boundary change technique allows experimenters to manipulate what the reader perceives parafoveally, or before the eyes actually land on the target word. When the reader’s eyes make a saccade to the target word, the eyes move across an invisible boundary and trigger a display change to the target word.

Preview Target Match Mismatch

scoon scook scoop bomp bort bond raff rall rack squean squead squeal

Procedure Match Condition

* * * |

William would always squean when his sister tickled him. | * * * * *

William would always squeal when his sister tickled him.Mismatch Condition

| William would always squead when his sister tickled him. |

William would always squeal when his sister tickled him.

First Fixation (ms)

250

260

270

280

290

300

310

ead/ean ook/oon ort/omp all/aff

MatchMismatch

Gaze Duration (ms)

280

290

300

310

320

330

340

ead/ean ook/oon ort/omp all/aff

MatchMismatch