Tracking Eye Movements Research Articles

Detection of Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)

Abstract: In recent years, Machine Learning has had a huge impact on a range of technological disciplines. As technology expands, machine learning provides an exciting opportunity in health care to help medical professionals care for patients and manage clinical data. It improves the accuracy of diagnoses, personalize health care, and find novel solutions to decades-old problems. Hospitals and health care companies have begun to recognize the ability of machine learning to improve decisionmaking and reduce risk in the medical field, which has led to several new and exciting career opportunities. Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a chronic condition generally characterized by hyperactivity, impulsiveness, and difficulty in paying attention. The early diagnosis of ADHD is highly desirable, and there is a need for developing assistive tools to support the diagnosis process in this regard. At present, there are two main methods available - using fMRI data and tracking eye movements. The proposed approach offers a method to assist with the ADHD diagnosis with an emphasis on young children who are still in the early stages of development. It tries to discover the eye-tracking patterns of ADHD using machine learning. The fundamental concept is to convert eye-tracking scan-paths into a visual representation, thus the diagnosis may be viewed as an image classification task.

Concept of Virtual Reality Training of Facility Management Employees Using Eye Tracking

In facility management, employees’ unique skills and high technical knowledge are necessary to operate buildings efficiently and safely. Employees acquiring professional skills requires the use of an effective training procedure. Traditional facility management training is often challenging because it requires using real devices in a work environment. It is only sometimes possible to stop these devices. Additionally, there is a risk of equipment damage or injury to employees. Therefore, organizing staff training in virtual reality (VR) seems interesting. Properly conducted training of employees in virtual reality allows for the reconstruction of identical test conditions for all participants, thanks to which high comparability of training results is achieved. In addition, virtual training allows for an in-depth analysis of each participant’s results. We can carefully analyze their movement, how they perform a task, and even their attention directed to critical elements. To be able to perform such an in-depth analysis, it was proposed to use eye-tracking technology in the VR glasses used during training and evaluation in the VR environment. Eye movement tracking allows for an accurate analysis of the focus of each participant on the critical elements of the devices in the decision-making process. It enables obtaining much more comprehensive information on the concentration and correctness of the employee’s actions. The result of the conducted research is the development of the concept of a VR environment for training and evaluating facility management staff using eye-tracking technology, enabling employees to improve and verify their qualifications in a very comfortable way without the need to access the existing infrastructure. The developed training procedure also allows the classification of training participants as fast and slow learners, which is very important for the employer, as it identifies employees who require additional training support. The developed approach was verified during the realization of selected training conducted with 100 employees working in facility management and was implemented as a commercially offered training service.

An arrayed optofluidic system for three-dimensional (3D) focal control via electrowetting.

A new lens capability for three-dimensional (3D) focal control is presented using an optofluidic system consisting of n × n arrayed liquid prisms. Each prism module contains two immiscible liquids in a rectangular cuvette. Using the electrowetting effect, the shape of the fluidic interface can be rapidly adjusted to create its straight profile with the prism's apex angle. Consequently, an incoming ray is steered at the tilted interface due to the refractive index difference between two liquids. To achieve 3D focal control, individual prisms in the arrayed system are simultaneously modulated, allowing incoming light rays to be spatially manipulated and converged on a focal point located at Pfocal (fx, fy, fz) in 3D space. Analytical studies were conducted to precisely predict the prism operation required for 3D focal control. Using three liquid prisms positioned on the x-, y-, and 45°-diagonal axes, we experimentally demonstrated 3D focal tunability of the arrayed optofluidic system, achieving focal tuning along lateral, longitudinal, and axial directions as wide as 0 ≤ fx ≤ 30 mm, 0 ≤ fy ≤ 30 mm, and 500 mm ≤ fz ≤ ∞. This focal tunability of the arrayed system allows for 3D control of the lens's focusing power, which could not be attained by solid-type optics without the use of bulky and complex mechanical moving components. This innovative lens capability for 3D focal control has potential applications in eye-movement tracking for smart displays, autofocusing of smartphone cameras, or solar tracking for smart photovoltaic systems.

Increasing the Social Interaction of Autism Child using Virtual Reality Intervention (VRI)

Nowadays there is an increase in number of autisms, a neuro-developmental disorder across the world. The level of autism varies with the symptoms such as inattention, interaction, social communication, repetitive behaviors, irritability and the like. Early recovery of a child from autism is necessary to live in a normal socio-communicable life. To measure the inattention of the autism child by enhancing the visual perception through virtual environment. The proposed Virtual Reality Intervention (VRI) enhances visual perception, learning, and social interaction. The proposed method observes the attention level of the autism child through eye tracking or eye movements who interacts with virtual world using eye tracking methodology. As eye tracking is the major component to measure the reduced looking time of objects and subjects which considered being the earliest signs of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). For observing the attention of kids during testing, Eye movements and gestures plays a major role. Using head position and eye pupil direction, attention has been analyzed. Quantitative and Qualitative findings conclude that the inattention of autism child can gradually be reduced by iterating the virtual therapy through eye ball tracking technique. Qualitative finding is done using Aberrant Behavior Checklist (ABC) and quantitative using eye-pupil and head position. Autism affected children can easily recovered from this inattention symptom by continuous iterations on virtual therapy. Similar virtual therapies can also be provided to address other symptoms of autism.

Tracking Eye Movements as a Window on Language Processing: The Visual World Paradigm

This entry overviews the pioneering experimental studies exploiting eye movement data to investigate language processing in real time. After examining how vision and language were found to be closely related, herein focus the discussion on the evolution of eye-tracking methodologies to investigate children’s language development. To conclude, herein provide some insights about the use of eye-tracking technology for research purposes, focusing on data collection and data analysis.

An Eye Tracking Investigation of Young People’s Gaze Behaviour to Gambling and Non-Gambling Moving Adverts

Introduction: Data from several areas of public health (e.g., harmful alcohol and tobacco) are consistent with the assertion that children’s exposure to advertising strategies increases intention to consume such products. Most studies have measured self-rated impact of gambling advertising using questionnaires. Given that gambling advertisements come in different forms such as print media/television advertising and contain variable content, it is difficult to understand using subjective measures which aspects of the gambling advertisements increase craving and desire to trigger a gambling session. In the present study, we applied a novel data-driven methodology that directly tracks eye movements to reveal attentional biases towards gambling adverts and promotions by examining differences in young people’s eye gaze behaviour when watching gambling and non-gambling (control) moving adverts. Method: A total of 98 (16–18 years old) children who self-identify as having a low or high craving to gambling watched gambling and non-gambling (control) television adverts, while their eye movements were recorded. Results: The results show that the data-driven method can isolate video clips that best distinguish people on the low-high craving spectrum, reveal the type of each video clip with the largest group differences, and accurately predict young people’s gambling craving on the basis of eye movement patterns. Conclusion: Our findings demonstrate that young people’s craving for gambling can be predicted based on their eye movements to video clips of gambling advertisements and that certain features of gambling advertisements may be more appealing to some group of viewers, particularly those with high craving for gambling.

An Integrated Application of Motion Sensing and Eye Movement Tracking Techniques in Perceiving User Behaviors in a Large Display Interaction

In public use of a large display, it is a usual phenomenon that multiple users individually participate in respective tasks on a common device. Previous studies have categorized such activity as independent interaction that involves little group engagement. However, by investigating how users approach, participate in, and interact with large displays, we found that parallel use is affected by group factors such as group size and between-user relationship. To gain a thorough understanding of individual and group behaviors, as well as parallel interaction task performance, one 70-inch display-based information searching task and experiment was conducted, in which a mobile eye movement tracking headset and a motion sensing RGB-depth sensor were simultaneously applied. The results showed that (1) a larger group size had a negative influence on the group users’ concentration on the task, perceived usability, and user experience; (2) a close relationship between users contributed to occasional collaborations, which was found to improve the users’ task completion time efficiency and their satisfaction on the large display user experience. This study proves that an integrated application of eye movement tracking and motion sensing is capable of understanding individual and group users’ behaviors simultaneously, and thus is a valid and reliable scheme in monitoring public activities that can be widely used in public large display systems.

The Influence of Spatial Cognitive Model Based on Eye Tracking on Wayfinding Behavior in Underground Parking Lots

Objective In view of the fact that the demand for indoor commercial underground parking lot maps is rising, the effect of underground parking lot map navigation with different spatial cognitive modes on individual wayfinding was studied from the perspective of spatial cognitive modes. Methods Firstly, Unity3D software was used to build the underground parking lot environment, and maps with different types of spatial cognitive modes were used as variables, and single factor analysis was used to record and analyze the number of hesitations of subjects in the process of wayfinding; secondly, eye-movement cognitive data of visual forms were obtained based on eye-tracking experiments; finally, the spatial cognitive modes of users and eye-movement indicators were combined to make recommendations on the design of underground parking lot maps and underground Finally, we suggest the improvement of the underground parking map design and the setting of underground parking related facilities based on the user spatial cognitive patterns and eye-movement indexes. Conclusion The map design affects the navigation effect of users in the process of finding the way in the underground parking lot, and the optimized design method of correlating spatial cognitive patterns and eye-movement tracking indicators is established to provide users with a convenient navigation experience and improve the equipment and facilities related to the underground parking lot for the shopping mall.

Application of eye movement tracking technology in web design

Eye movement tracking technology is an emerging technology in recent years and has been widely used in many fields. Tracking people’s eyeball movement can help to understand human’s emotion and behavior, reflect human’s subjective intention on things, and provide a basis for the research and development in many fields. This paper mainly reviewed the eyeball movement tracking technology, and made a brief analysis on its worldwide application, in order to lay a foundation for better understanding the research of eyeball movement tracking technology.

Investigating the relationship between eye movements and the situation awareness of forklift operators for accident prevention

This study investigated differences in eye movement indicators among forklift operators with different situation awareness (SA) and the relationship between eye movement indicators and the SA of forklift operators to verify the effectiveness of eye movement tracking in assessing SA and the factors affecting operators’ SA for improving forklift operation safety. An eye movement tracking system was used to collect eye movement data from 15 forklift operators while they performed a series of forklift tasks. The SA global assessment technique (SAGAT) was used to determine the SA score of each operator. The results indicated that the fixation duration percentage (FDP), fixation count percentage (FCP) and average fixation duration (AFD) all had a positive relationship with SA in the work-related area of interest (AOI). These findings support eye movement tracking as an effective technique to quantitatively evaluate forklift operators’ SA and provide insights into how forklift operators’ SA could be improved.

Adaptative damping assistance in bimanual laparoscopic surgery.

Laparoscopic surgery has demonstrated various advantages for the patients' care, but also presents some difficulties for the surgeons, such as kinematic restrictions. Robotic comanipulation, in which control of instruments is shared between the robot and the surgeon, can provide adaptative damping assistance which allows stabilisation of movements. The objective of the present study was to determine the contribution of this assistance on a bimanual laparoscopic task. Adaptative damping was studied on Peg Transfer task, performed by eighteen surgery-naive subjects. This exercise was repeated seven times without (Classic repetitions) and seven times with comanipulated robots (Robot repetitions), in a randomised order. We measured task performance, using Peg Transfer score; gesture performance, using hand oscillations and travelled distance; eye-tracking movements as an indicator of emergence of expertise. Participants' perceived workload was assessed by NASA TLX questionnaire, and difference in impression between the two conditions by UEQ questionnaire. Adaptative damping improved gesture performance (oscillations F(1,17) = 23.473, p < 0.001, η2 = 0.580), with a statistically significant simple effect on the tool oscillation for both non-dominant (p < 0.001) and dominant hands (p = 0.005), without influencing task performance (mean Peg Transfer score t(17) = 0.920, p = 0.382, d = 0.29), but deteriorating eye-tracking movements associated with emergence of expertise (mean fixation rate per second F(1,17) = 6.318, p = 0.022, η2 = 0.271), at the cost of a high perceived workload (NASA TLX score 59.78/100). Assistance by adaptative damping applied by comanipulated robots improved gesture performance during a laparoscopic bimanual task, without impacting task's performance without allowing the emergence of comportments associated with an expertise, and at the cost of a high perceived workload. Further research should investigate this assistance on more precise and clinical tasks performed by professionals.

Pathogenesis of Comorbid ADHD and Chinese Developmental Dyslexia: Evidence From Eye-Movement Tracking and Rapid Automatized Naming

Background: ADHD and Chinese developmental dyslexia (DD) have a very high comorbidity rate; however, which cognitive deficits characterize the comorbidity and when they occur during cognitive processing are still under debate. Methods: Rapid automatic naming (RAN) tasks with eye-movement tracking were conducted with 75 children who were typically developing, had comorbid ADHD and DD, had only ADHD, and had only DD. Results: The clinical groups had longer first fixation durations than the control for RAN digits. Temporal eye-movement measures, such as gaze duration and total reading time, were found to vary between the comorbidity and ADHD groups. Spatial eye-movement measures, such as regression probability and incoming saccade amplitude, differed between the comorbidity and DD groups. Conclusions: These results indicate that investigation with eye-movement measures combined with RAN tasks can strengthen the understanding of the pathogenesis of comorbid ADHD and DD.

Automatic Extraction of Oculographic Signals as Digital Biomarkers for Alzheimer's Disease.

Similar to other neurological diseases, subtle early neurological changes that occur in Alzheimer's Disease (AD) are difficult to quantify and track objectively. One relevant bio-signal is eye movement, as it presents a unique window into cognitive processes as a direct measure of real-time inputs to the brain. Eye-tracking allows us to estimate timestamped activity of neural function and begin to infer and quantify attention, reprocessing (eg. word revisits), and many other aspects relevant to assessing AD. The goal of this study was to investigate the saccadic movements and trial progress during administration of the Stroop test in AD compared to normal controls. 5 AD subjects and 12 age-matched cognitively normal controls were recruited from the Johns Hopkins Memory and Alzheimer's Treatment Center and the Movement Disorders Clinic at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. An Eyelink Portable Duo in head-free-to-move mode was used to track eye movements. Movement of the eyes were analyzed by automatically segmenting saccade movements throughout a trial. We then analyzed the eye movements in the context of cognitive performance, by identifying when subjects progress to each word in the Stroop test. We compared the performance of each group using a Wilcoxon RankSum test with the SciPy package using Python. Preliminary results show that 60% (3/5) of AD subjects were unable to complete the Stroop task in 80 seconds. Individuals with AD had more saccades (p=0.105) with greater saccadic overshoot (p=0.092) and a greater maximum saccade velocity (p=0.035) on average compared to cognitively normal controls. AD subjects also took much longer to complete the first (p=0.114) and second lines (p=0.092) compared to healthy controls, suggesting initial confusion and hesitation. AD subjects change their gaze more often with greater speed and less precision than age-matched controls. These data demonstrate feasibility of using automatic quantitative evaluation of eye movements in AD. In the future, we will determine the utility of using this tool for early detection of AD and tracking its progression, along with combining other measures such as voice and handwriting (multimodal) to provide insights into early physiological changes in AD.

Theory-based approach for assessing cognitive load during time-critical resource-managing human–computer interactions: an eye-tracking study

Computerized systems are taking on increasingly complex tasks. Consequently, monitoring automated computerized systems is becoming increasingly demanding for human operators, which is particularly relevant in time-critical situations. A possible solution might be adapting human–computer interfaces (HCI) to the operators’ cognitive load. Here, we present a novel approach for theory-based measurement of cognitive load based on tracking eye movements of 42 participants while playing a serious game simulating time-critical situations that required resource management at different levels of difficulty. Gaze data was collected within narrow time periods, calculated based on log data interpreted in the light of the time-based resource-sharing model. Our results indicated that eye fixation frequency, saccadic rate, and pupil diameter significantly predicted task difficulty, while performance was best predicted by eye fixation frequency. Subjectively perceived cognitive load was significantly associated with the rate of microsaccades. Moreover our results indicated that more successful players tended to use breaks in gameplay to actively monitor the scene, while players who use these times to rest are more likely to fail the level. The presented approach seems promising for measuring cognitive load in realistic situations, considering adaptation of HCI.

Evaluating the effectiveness of physical exercise in improving standardized testing performances through attention indices.

In the United States, standardized tests have risen in prevalence, extending their importance from education placement to employment. Attention is crucial to improving testing performance. Past studies have established that acute, coordinative, aerobic exercise improves attention, which is measured by the D2 Attention Test, emotional analysis, reading time, and eye movement tracking. No studies have drawn connections between physical exercise's quantifiable improvement in attention to improvements in standardized tests; therefore, this study would attempt to do so. This study defines attention to be positively related to reading speed and negatively related to the number of eye drifts. High school students were selected to read and answer two reading passages from an SAT (Scholastic Assessment Test) exam, before and after a short 80% intensity run. Their reading times, facial video, and test scores were recorded. Dlib plots the facial landmark and OpenCV tracks movement of the pupil. Through paired-samples t-tests, this study found out that after exercise, subjects displayed increased reading speed and fewer eye drifts, coupled with increased mean scores. Thus, this study demonstrated that running, as an acute, coordinative, aerobic exercise, helps increase the testing performance of the SAT reading section by measuring attention. Future research could focus on including head movement as an attention index, replicate the experiment on different standardized tests or exercises, and conduct natural experiments to better simulate real-life conditions to increase applicability.

Alcohol corporations and the metaverse: Threats to public health?

Alcohol corporations and the metaverse: Threats to public health?

Clear Fundus Images Through High-Speed Tracking Using Glare-Free IR Color Technology

Fundus images contain extensive health information. However, patients hardly obtain their fundus images by themselves. Although glare-free infrared (IR) imaging enables easy acquisition of fundus images, it is monographic and challenging to process in real-time in response to high-speed and involuntary fixational eye movement and in vivo blurring. Therefore, we propose applying our IR color technology and providing clear fundus images by high-speed tracking of involuntary fixational eye movements and eliminating in vivo blurs by deconvolution. We tested whether the proposed camera system was applicable in medical practice and capable of medical examination. We verified the IR color fundus camera system could detect ophthalmological and lifestyle-related diseases.

Don't look at me like that: Integration of gaze direction and facial expression.

Efficient decoding of facial expressions and gaze direction supports reactions to social environments. Although both cues are processed fast and accurately, when and how these cues are integrated is still debated. We investigated the temporal integration of gaze and emotion cues. Participants responded to letters that were randomly presented on four faces. Two of these faces initially showed direct gaze, two showed averted gaze. Upon target presentation, two faces changed gaze direction (from averted to direct and vice versa). Simultaneously, facial expressions changed from neutral to either an approach- or an avoidance-oriented emotion expression (Experiment 1a: angry/fearful; Experiment 1b: happy/disgusted). Although angry and fearful expressions diminished any effects of gaze direction (Experiment 1a), a direct gaze advantage was found for happy and an averted gaze advantage for disgusted faces (Experiment 1b). This pattern is consistent with hypotheses suggesting a processing benefit when emotion expression and gaze information are congruent in terms of approach- or avoidance-orientation. In Experiment 2, we tracked eye movements and, again, found evidence for an approach-avoidance-congruency advantage for happy and disgusted faces both in performance and gaze behavior. Gaze behavior analyses suggested an integration of gaze and emotion information that was already visible from 300 ms after target onset. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

The Effects of Normal Aging, Subjective Cognitive Decline, Mild Cognitive Impairment, or Alzheimer’s Disease on Visual Search

Background: Alzheimer’s disease (AD) has been confirmed as an influencing factor of visual impairment, but potential concomitant effects on visual and cognitive performance are not well understood. Objective: To provide a new method for early screening of Alzheimer’s disease and further explore the theoretical mechanism of the decline of whole visual and cognitive performance in AD. Methods: We studied 60 individuals without dementia as normal control (NC), 74 individuals with subjective cognitive decline (SCD), 60 individuals with amnesia mild cognitive impairment (aMCI), and 75 patients with AD on a battery of tests designed to measure multiple aspects of basic and higher-order visual perception and cognition. All subjects performed on same visual and cognitive test batteries. Results: The results showed both of four groups, with the stimulus-presentation time being longer, the visual-search performance improved, and both the eye interest-area first fixation duration and the interest-area-fixation count increased. Particularly under the noise-masking condition, the AD group performed the worst at stimulus-presentation times between 300 and 900 ms. The aMCI group, but not the SCD group, performed worse than the NC group at the stimulus-presentation time of either 300 or 500 ms. The interest-area-fixation count was higher in all the patient groups than that in the NC group, and distinguishable between participants with AD and those with SCD or aMCI. Conclusion: The visual-search performance combined with eye-movement tracking under the noise-masking condition can be used for distinguishing AD from normal aging, SCD, and aMCI.

Image analysis and error detection in source software code

Subject of study. We study cognitive mechanisms for the analysis of images of source software code and detection of errors in it by a human. Aim. The aim of this study is to determine the influence of the professional skill of visual error detection in a Python source code on the control over oculomotor processes to be used for the subsequent modeling of the identified principles in artificial intelligence systems. Method. The eye movement properties of a human during error detection in the images of software code were investigated using eye movement tracking technology by means of the Russian software–hardware suite “Neurobureau,” which enabled a complete set of psychophysiological studies to be conducted. The test subjects completed two tasks: explaining the software code and finding an error in it. Each task comprised 10 stimuli with software code in Python language normalized to length and complexity and with syntax highlighting. The task completion time was not limited. Eight programmers with different professional experience (from 1 to 13 years) participated in the study. Main results. With increasing professional skill in image analysis, humans develop eye movement strategies enabling more effective performance of tasks with minimum effort. These strategies entail division of an integral software code into individual units relevant for the analysis. We discovered that experienced programmers exhibited fewer fixations, shorter scanpath length, and larger saccade amplitudes than novice programmers. Notably, the speed of saccades, in particular the broad searching eye movements during the task of software code explanation, increases with professional experience. We demonstrated that visual error detection is mainly determined by recognition of the details in a text that can be found exclusively based on the semantics and grammar of the programming language. We established that reading of software code texts is different from both viewing visual scenes and reading texts written in a natural language. Professional experience minimizes the efforts in this work, similar to any other type of professional activity. Eye movement control during code reading is guided by the knowledge of the programming language, understanding of context, and knowledge of the semantics and grammar of the language, as well as the low-spatial-frequency description of the images of strings and words, which is used to develop the skill of reading and recognition of the general configuration of strings and words in a natural language. Practical significance. The conclusions obtained in this study can be used to describe the existing techniques and create new neuromorphic algorithms (based on the strategies developed during human evolution) for the generation and correction of software code.