Improving Reading and Eye Movement Control in Readers with Oculomotor and Visuo-Attentional Deficits

Abstract

The initial saccade of experienced readers tends to land halfway between the beginning and the middle of words, at a position originally referred to as the preferred viewing location (PVL). This study investigated whether a simple physical manipulation—namely, increasing the saliency (brightness or color) of the letter located at the PVL—can positively influence saccadic targeting strategies and optimize reading performance. An eye-movement experiment was conducted with 25 adults and 24 s graders performing a lexical decision task. Results showed that this manipulation had no effect on initial landing positions in proficient readers, who already landed most frequently at the PVL, suggesting that PVL saliency is irrelevant once automatized saccade targeting routines are established. In contrast, the manipulation shifted the peak of the landing site distribution toward the PVL for a cluster of readers with immature saccadic strategies (with low reading-level scores and ILPs close to the beginning of words), but only in the brightness condition, and had a more compelling effect in a cluster with oculomotor instability (with flattened and diffuse landing position curves along with oculomotor and visuo-attentional deficits). These findings suggest that guiding the eyes toward the PVL may offer a novel way to improve reading efficiency, particularly for individuals with oculomotor and visuo-attentional difficulties.