Optimal Viewing Position in Chinese Reading

中文閱讀文字辨認之最佳位置

楊憲明(Hsien-Ming Yang)

《特殊教育與復健學報》 5期 (1997/06) Pp. 37-59

摘要

本實驗研究旨在探討中文字視覺辨認是否存在最佳辨認位置，及其對文字辨認的影響。實驗時，研究者選擇四種二字元詞和二種三字元詞為實驗材料，將每一個詞劃分為五個等長的區段，以每一個區段的中心點，作為受試者在辨認這個詞時眼睛的最初始停落點，以觀察受試者的文字辨認時間，是否隨著眼睛最初始停落點的不同而有顯著的變化。實驗者同時控制二字元詞和三字元詞的使用頻率和結構複雜度兩項因素，以觀察眼睛最初始停落點和這二項因素對文字辨認時間的影響是否有交互作用。在實驗時，二字元詞或三字元詞被呈現在電腦螢幕上，受試者眼睛被引導到預設的最初始停落點，此時，受試者以最快的時間來辨認所看到的詞。本實驗研究發現，當眼睛最初始的停落點是在詞的中心時，辨認的時間最短，眼睛最初始的停落點離開詞的中心越遠，辨認的時間就越長。這個研究結果顯示，中文字視覺辨認的最佳辨認位置是在詞的中心。這個最佳辨認位置在中文閱讀時，對眼睛的移動控制可能有顯著的影響。

並列摘要

The study addressed the effect of the Optimal Viewing Position (OVP) in word on recognition of Chinese. It has been frequently reported in English that the optimal viewing position in word exerts a great influence on word recognition, with increase in response time and refixation probability for recognizing a word when the initial fixation of the eyes deviates from the optimal viewing position. With the findings, this study was conducted to investigate whether Chinese words have an optimal viewing positing for recognition as well though structural differences exist between Chinese and alphabetic languages. In the study, subjects participated in a word recognition task where the initial fixation of subjects' eyes was directed to fixate at one of several predetermined locations in a presented word on computer screen, and the subjects were asked to recognize the word as soon as possible, with response times being recorded by the computer. The presented words in the study are two and three-characters words and vary in word frequency and word structural complexity. The results showed that response times are shortest if the initial fixation is located at the center of words, that is, at the space between the first and second character of two character words or at the second character of three-character words. The results also showed that response times increase as a function of deviation of initial fixation from the center of words. The results suggest that there is an optimal viewing position for recognition of Chinese words in isolation. The influence of the optimal viewing position in Chinese words on the control of eye movements in Chinese reading was discussed in the study.