Word length and frequency effects on children’s eye movements during silent reading.

In the present study we measured the eye movements of a large sample of 2nd grade German speaking children and a control group of adults during a silent reading task. To be able to directly investigate the interaction of word length and frequency effects we employed controlled sentence frames with embedded target words in an experimental design in which length and frequency were manipulated independently of one another. Unlike previous studies which have investigated the interaction of word length and frequency effects in children, we used age-appropriate word frequencies for children. We found significant effects of word length and frequency for both children and adults while effects were generally greater for children. The interaction of word length and frequency was significant for children in gaze duration and total viewing time eye movement measures but not for adults. Our results suggest that children rely on sublexical decoding of infrequent words, leading to greater length effects for infrequent than frequent words while adults do not show this effect when reading children’s reading materials. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)

Accession Number: 2015-37152-005. PMID: 26048684 Partial author list: First Author & Affiliation: Tiffin-Richards, Simon P.; Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, Germany. Release Date: 20150831. Publication Type: Journal (0100), Peer Reviewed Journal (0110). Format Covered: Electronic. Document Type: Journal Article. Language: English. Major Descriptor: Eye Movements; Silent Reading; Words (Phonetic Units). Minor Descriptor: Age Differences. Classification: Developmental Psychology (2800). Population: Human (10); Male (30); Female (40). Location: Germany. Age Group: Childhood (birth-12 yrs) (100); Adulthood (18 yrs & older) (300). Methodology: Empirical Study; Longitudinal Study; Quantitative Study. References Available: Y. Page Count: 11. Issue Publication Date: Aug, 2015. Publication History: First Posted Date: Jun 3, 2015; Revised Date: May 8, 2015; First Submitted Date: Dec 23, 2014. Copyright Statement: All rights reserved. Elsevier Ltd. 2015.