Verbatim, standard, or edited? Reading patterns of different captioning styles among deaf, hard of hearing, and hearing viewers

One of the most frequently recurring themes in captioning is whether captions should be edited or verbatim. The authors report on the results of an eye-tracking study of captioning for deaf and hard of hearing viewers reading different types of captions. By examining eye movement patterns when these viewers were watching clips with verbatim, standard, and edited captions, the authors tested whether the three different caption styles were read differently by the study participants (N = 40): 9 deaf, 21 hard of hearing, and 10 hearing individuals. Interesting interaction effects for the proportion of dwell time and fixation count were observed. In terms of group differences, deaf participants differed from the other two groups only in the case of verbatim captions. The results are discussed with reference to classical reading studies, audiovisual translation, and a new concept of viewing speed.     

Time spent viewing captions on television programs

The eye movements of 23 deaf subjects, ages 14 to 61 years, were recorded 30 times per second while the subjects watched four 2.5-minute captioned television programs. The eye movement data were analyzed to determine the percentage of time each subject actually looked at the captions on the screen. It was found that subjects gazed at the captions 84% of the time, at the video picture 14% of the time, and off the video 2% of the time. Age, sex, and educational level appeared to have little influence on time spent viewing captions. When caption speed increased from the slowest speed (100 words per minute, or wpm) to the fastest speed (180 wpm), mean percentage of time spent gazing at captions increased only from 82% to 86%. A distinctive characteristic of the data was the considerable variation from subject to subject and also within subjects (from video to video) in regard to percentage of time spent gazing at captions.     

Does adding video and subtitles to an audio lesson facilitate its comprehension?

We examined whether adding video and subtitles to an audio lesson facilitates its comprehension and whether the comprehension depends on participants' cognitive abilities, including working memory and executive functions, and where they looked during video viewing. Participants received lessons consisting of statements of facts under four conditions: audio-only, audio with verbatim subtitles, audio with relevant video, and audio with both subtitles and video. Comprehension was assessed as the accuracy in answering multiple-choice questions for content memory. We found that subtitles facilitated comprehension whereas video did not. In addition, comprehension of audio lessons with video depended on participants' cognitive abilities and eye movement pattern: a more centralized (looking mainly at the screen center) eye movement pattern predicted better comprehension as opposed to a distributed pattern (with distributed regions of interest). Thus, whether video facilitates comprehension of audio lessons depends on both learners’ cognitive abilities and where they look during video viewing.     

视听测试中考生观看行为影响因素的实证研究

引入视频是大学英语考试提高测试效度的一次尝试,但考生是否观看视频直接影响到测试效度是否得到提升。通过分析答题时考生眼部录像、考后问卷和访谈数据,本研究发现考生在完成选择题时会看视频,而完成填空题时则基本不看。进一步分析完成选择题时考生的眼球运动,发现题目设计和音视频特征等多种因素影响考生观看视频。最后,研究者通过分析问卷和访谈数据,总结出考生具体观看的视频信息种类及其作用。     

On‐screen print: the role of captions as a supplemental literacy tool

Children living in poverty are 1.3 times as likely as non‐poor children to experience reading difficulties and lack key oral experiences that contribute to early literacy development. The purpose of this research was to study the effects of viewing commercially available educational television with closed captions. Seventy second‐ and third‐grade economically disadvantaged children living in urban locations participated in this experimental research design. Children were randomly assigned to view videos with or without closed captions. Captions helped children recognise and read more words, identify the meaning of those words, generate inferences regarding programme content and transfer these skills to a normative code‐related skill task. Risk status moderated word recognition performance: those at risk benefited from captions while those who were not at risk recognised more words when captions were absent.     

学习困难儿童阅读拼音过程的眼动特征

以拼音诗和拼音短文为实验材料,利用眼动方法,采集65名儿童阅读拼音材料时的眼动参数,分析学习困难儿童阅读拼音的眼动特征。结果发现:(1)学习困难儿童阅读拼音更为困难,每次注视范围小;(2)学习困难儿童阅读拼音的注视点持续时间长,眼跳距离小,丢失时间多。结果显示:学习困难儿童阅读拼音眼动模式差,眼动模式与理解拼音成绩关系密切。     

Television and vision: reading captions when vision is blurred

Closed captions for television have become an important means of communication for hearing-impaired people. Yet, previous studies show that hearing-impaired people are very likely to have visual problems that may interfere with caption reading. In this study, the effect of reduced vision on caption reading is examined. Six hearing-impaired and 14 hearing subjects viewed segments of captioned movies on a 19-inch television screen at a distance of three meters. All of the subjects had normal vision. Their vision was blurred with plus lenses of five different strengths. The data show that caption reading is affected by relatively small amounts of blur. If a person has even a slight visual problem, the caption letters under normal television viewing conditions are too small for maximum reading performance.     

Investigating video as a means to promote vocabulary for at-risk children

Two studies on the role of video on vocabulary learning were conducted in kindergarten classrooms with substantial numbers of children from low-income and Dual Language Learning (DLL) backgrounds. In the first study (n = 78), the effect of video viewing was compared with the effect of book reading on vocabulary learning. In the second study (n = 89), the effect of repeated viewing of video was compared with the effect of single viewing of video on vocabulary learning. Pre-test and post-test receptive and expressive vocabulary measures, which were aligned with the content in the studies, were administered. Analysis of Variance was used to test the effect of condition (i.e., video viewing versus book reading and single versus repeated reading) on children’s word knowledge. Results showed no difference in vocabulary learning between the video viewing and book reading conditions. Findings showed that there was no difference in vocabulary learning between children in the single and repeated viewing condition on the receptive measure, but children in the repeated viewing condition showed higher gains in vocabulary on the expressive measure. No differences were found in either study between children with higher and lower vocabulary knowledge.     

Eye movement behaviour during reading of Japanese sentences: Effects of word length and visual complexity

Two experiments are presented that examine how the visual characteristics of Japanese words influence eye movement behaviour during reading. In Experiment 1, reading behaviour was compared for words comprising either one or two kanji characters. The one-character words were significantly less likely to be fixated on first-pass, and had significantly longer overall reading times, than the two-character words. In Experiment 2, reading behaviour was compared for two-kanji character words, for which the first character was either visually simple or visually complex (determined by the number of strokes). Visual complexity significantly influenced total word reading times and the probability of the individual visually simple/complex characters being fixated on first pass. Additional analyses showed no preferred viewing position for two-kanji character words. Overall, the study provides experimental evidence of an influence of specific visual characteristics of Japanese words on eye movement behaviour during reading, as shown by both fixation probabilities and reading times. The findings must be explained by processing at (or beyond) a visual level impacting on eye movement behavior during reading of Japanese text.     

西方关于阅读的眼动研究

阅读中的眼动能反应出阅读中的认知加工。本对近期西方关于阅读的眼动研究进行了全面的回顾。章主要讨论了阅读中的眼动特征、阅读的信息加工与眼动的关系、跳读中的信息整合的特点、影响阅读中眼动的因素以及两种重要的眼动控制模型。笔对这些方面的眼动研究进行了评价和总结。     

要求少儿读经是逆潮流而动

一些现代私塾开设读经课,要求少年儿童用大量时间读经;有的教育专家也公开倡导少儿读经是“传承文化”的需要。这种现象是逆潮流而动。五四运动时期就反对文言文,提倡白话文;反对读经,提倡科学。读经不能救国,少儿读经弊多利少,都早有定论。现在倡导读经,是教育的倒退,违背少年儿童身心发展的规律,因而注定是短命的,不可能长期存在下去。     

Does previewing answer choice options improve performance on reading tests?

Previewing answer-choice options before finishing reading the text is a widely employed test-taking behavior. In the present study we examined whether previewing is related to item response accuracy and response time, using data from Chinese learners of varying English proficiency levels and English native speakers. We examined eye movement patterns of participants who completed online multiple-choice sentence completion tasks, and how previewing was related to reading performance and whether the relation varied as a function of English proficiency level. The results showed that, relative to no previewing, previewing was associated with a significantly lower probability of answering an item correctly but not with significantly longer response time. Importantly, these relations varied across English proficiency levels such that participants with higher proficiency performed better without previewing, but there was no difference for lower-intermediate learners of English. These findings suggest that previewing does not facilitate performance on a sentence comprehension task, but instead interferes with the comprehension process, particularly for individuals with relatively high language proficiency.     

朗读表达水平对大学生阅读影响的眼动研究

本研究采用眼动记录技术探讨不同朗读表达水平的大学生朗读和默读即时加工过程的眼动特点。通过对朗读表达水平高和低的大学生在朗读和默读注视次数、注视点持续时间、眼动轨迹等眼动指标的比较,结果发现:不同朗读表达水平学生默读时的眼动特征不存在显著差异,而朗读的眼动特征存在着显著差异;不同朗读表达水平学生朗读和默读时的眼动模式高度一致。     

学习困难儿童观看图片的眼动研究

本文探讨了学习困难儿童(学困儿童)观看图片过程的认知加工及眼动特性。要求被试观看图片后回答相关问题,并对观看过程中的眼动情况进行记录。结果发现,与学习优秀儿童、学习一般儿童相比,学困儿童提取图片信息的效率低,完成认知任务的质量差;在眼动参数上,学困儿童的注视次数多,眼跳距离小,与其他两组儿童相比差异显著。结果提示,学困儿童认知加工效率低与眼动模式差关系密切。     

Exploring the eye‐movement patterns as Chinese children read texts: a developmental perspective

This study was to investigate Chinese children's eye patterns while reading different text genres from a developmental perspective. Eye movements were recorded while children in the second through sixth grades read two expository texts and two narrative texts. Across passages, overall word frequency was not significantly different between the two genres. Results showed that all children had longer fixation durations for low‐frequency words. They also had longer fixation durations on content words. These results indicate that children adopted a word‐based processing strategy like skilled readers do. However, only older children's rereading times were affected by genre. Overall, eye‐movement patterns of older children reported in this study are in accordance with those of skilled Chinese readers, but younger children are more likely to be responsive to word characteristics than text level when reading a Chinese text.     

Improving instruction of future teachers: A multimedia approach that supports implementation of evidence-based vocabulary practices

Teacher education efforts must prepare future teachers to implement evidence-based practices that are effective for all students. A strand of practices necessary for reading competence is vocabulary instruction; however, teachers spend less time teaching vocabulary as opposed to other literacy skills. In this experimental study, researchers investigated a multimedia-based intervention, which pairs video with a Content Acquisition Podcast (i.e., video plus CAP) to teach preservice teachers (N = 49) to implement vocabulary practices with struggling students. Those who watched the video plus CAP used significantly more teaching behaviors associated with an evidence-based vocabulary practice during instruction than the comparison group.     

Qualitative descriptions of error recovery patterns across reading level and sentence type: an eye movement analysis.

Purposes of the present study included describing a variety of error recovery patterns based on eye movement (EM) measures of sentence parsing across reading level and error type. A qualitative pattern analysis of EM mappings was completed for students with reading disabilities (n = 10) and nondisabled students (n = 10) who were parsing control and erred sentences. Independent variables included error type (syntactically ambiguous, semantically anomalous, and control sentences) and reading proficiency level. Dependent variables consisted of seven eye movement measures. Chi-square analyses were performed to examine group differences across frequencies per pattern. Results suggest that the error recovery strategies deployed by both groups were similar in pattern and frequency; patterns were largely organized, strategic, and efficient, as predicted. Evidence for seven newly defined strategies was found, with indications of multiple strategies within sentences by both groups. Strategies tended to be error "reanalysis" (vs. "recovery") heuristics, in that readers from both groups used regressions to reanalyze regions of inconsistency rather than regions of disambiguation. Earlier conclusions regarding disorganized processing and individual differences among adolescents with reading disabilities are discussed.     

Comprehending coherent and incoherent texts: evidence from eye movement patterns and recall performance

The effect of text structure on the reading process and recall performance was examined. Adult readers’ eye movements were monitored when they read coherently and incoherently structured texts (N=19). Incoherence was brought about by changing the sentence order in the middle paragraphs of the two stimulus texts. Each subject read and learned one text in a coherent and the other in an incoherent form in two experimental sessions. Immediate free recall followed the reading. The eye movement data showed that during the first pass reading, i.e. initial reading of a sentence until the end of the sentence is reached, structurally incoherent text segments attracted the largest number of regressive fixations, and, hence, were given more visual attention than coherent text segments (indicated by the total duration of fixations). On the other hand, more rereadings, i.e. all fixations made after the first pass reading but before moving away from the given sentence, were devoted to text segments resolving the incoherence. Textual incoherence was further found to lead to inferior recall. However, no clear-cut correspondence between eye movement behavior and quantitative recall performance was found.     

小学三年级学生语文快速阅读训练的实验研究——来自眼动的证据

采用自然实验法,选取小学三年级学生作为被试,按照是否参加快速阅读训练将其分为实验班和对照班。结果表明:经过快速阅读训练,实验班学生的阅读速度和有效读速都得到了显著提升。用眼动仪对实验班和对照班进行阅读过程中的眼动情况的记录分析,结果发现:快速阅读训练在不影响阅读理解率的情况下,可以有效提高学生的阅读速度;快速阅读训练能有效减少阅读时的注视次数,同时缩短平均注视时间,减少眼跳次数和回视次数。