Lost in a Story, Detached from the Words
Eekhof,Lynn Kuijpers,Moniek Faber,Myrthe Gao,Xin Mak,Marloes van den Hoven,Emiel Willems,Roel
Eekhof,Lynn
Kuijpers,Moniek
Faber,Myrthe
Gao,Xin
Mak,Marloes
van den Hoven,Emiel
Willems,Roel
Abstract
This article explores the relationship between low- and high-level aspects of reading by studying the interplay between word processing, as measured with eye tracking, and narrative absorption and liking, as measured with questionnaires. Specifically, we focused on how individual differences in sensitivity to lexical word characteristics—measured as the effect of these characteristics on gaze duration—were related to narrative absorption and liking. By reanalyzing a large data set consisting of three previous eye-tracking experiments in which subjects (N = 171) read literary short stories, we replicated the well-established finding that word length, lemma frequency, position in sentence, age of acquisition, and orthographic neighborhood size of words influenced gaze duration. More importantly, we found that individual differences in the degree of sensitivity to three of these word characteristics, i.e., word length, lemma frequency, and age of acquisition, were negatively related to print exposure and to a lesser degree to narrative absorption and liking. Even though the underlying mechanisms of this relationship are still unclear, we believe the current findings underline the need to map out the interplay between, on the one hand, the technical and, on the other hand, the subjective processes of reading by studying reading behavior in more natural settings.
Description
Funding Information: This work was supported the Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (NWO) under Vidi Grant [276-89-007] awarded to Roel Willems and Veni Grant [VI.Veni.191G.001] awarded to Myrthe Faber. We would like to thank Kiel Christianson and one anonymous reviewer for their feedback on an earlier version of this manuscript. We would also like to thank Tobias Richter, Johanna Kaakinen, and two anonymous reviewers for their comments on this article. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
Date
2021-01-06
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Eekhof, L, Kuijpers, M, Faber, M, Gao, X, Mak, M, van den Hoven, E & Willems, R 2021, 'Lost in a Story, Detached from the Words', Discourse Processes, vol. 58, no. 7, pp. 595-616. https://doi.org/10.1080/0163853X.2020.1857619