Joint effect of insertion of spaces and word length in saccade target selection in Chinese reading

Abstract

The present study examined how insertion of spaces before and after a word affects saccade target selection in Chinese reading. We found that inserting spaces in Chinese text changes the eye movement behaviour of Chinese readers. They are less likely to fixate on the character near the space and will try their best to process the entire word with less fixations when a space is inserted after a word, making the final characters in a long word less likely to be fixated on. However, we did not find evidence that they target their eyes at the word centre when a space is inserted before or after a word. These results enhance our understanding of the mechanisms of eye movement control in Chinese reading.