Parafoveal Load of Word N+1 Modulates Preprocessing Effectiveness of Word N+2 in Chinese Reading.

Preview benefits (PBs) from two words to the right of the fixated one (i.e., word N + 2) and associated parafoveal-on-foveal effects are critical for proposals of distributed lexical processing during reading. This experiment examined parafoveal processing during reading of Chinese sentences, using...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Experimental Psychology. Human Perception & Performance Vol. 36; no. 6; pp. 1669 - 1677
Main Authors: Yan, Ming, Kliegl, Reinhold, Shu, Hua, Pan, Jinger, Zhou, Xiaolin
Format: Article
Published: American Psychological Association December 2010
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Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
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Summary:Preview benefits (PBs) from two words to the right of the fixated one (i.e., word N + 2) and associated parafoveal-on-foveal effects are critical for proposals of distributed lexical processing during reading. This experiment examined parafoveal processing during reading of Chinese sentences, using a boundary manipulation of N + 2-word preview with low- and high-frequency words N + 1. The main findings were (a) an identity PB for word N + 2 that was (b) primarily observed when word N + 1 was of high frequency (i.e., an interaction between frequency of word N + 1 and PB for word N + 2), and (c) a parafoveal-on-foveal frequency effect of word N + 1 for fixation durations on word N. We discuss implications for theories of serial attention shifts and parallel distributed processing of words during reading. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.