The Role of Attention and Spatial Selection in Fluent Reading

Abstract

Eye movements are an essential part of reading behavior. They are alsointeresting from a perceptual and information processing point of view,As they provide a way to study a very complex and yet ecologically validmental process in a simple and well structured visual environment. Inthe current chapter we discuss a core issue of current research, therole of visual selective attention in reading. After introducingsequential attention shift models as the currently dominant theory ofeye movement control we explore some limitations of this family ofmodels. This includes a critique of the central claim that attention isallocated sequentially in a word-by-word fashion and a number of issuesregarding the time line of information processing and oculomotorcontrol. We conclude with a brief look at two alternative theoreticalconceptions.