Wearable Eye Tracker Research Articles

The Effects of Competition on Exercise Intensity and the User Experience of Exercise during Virtual Reality Bicycling for Young Adults

Background: Regular moderate–vigorous intensity exercise is recommended for adults as it can improve longevity and reduce health risks associated with a sedentary lifestyle. However, there are barriers to achieving intense exercise that may be addressed using virtual reality (VR) as a tool to promote exercise intensity and adherence, particularly through visual feedback and competition. The purpose of this work is to compare visual feedback and competition within fully immersive VR to enhance exercise intensity and user experience of exercise for young adults; and to describe and compare visual attention during each of the conditions. Methods: Young adults (21–34 years old) bicycled in three 5 min VR conditions (visual feedback, self-competition, and competition against others). Exercise intensity (cycling cadence and % of maximum heart rate) and visual attention (derived from a wearable eye tracking sensor) were measured continuously. User experience was measured by an intrinsic motivation questionnaire, perceived effort, and participant preference. A repeated-measures ANOVA with paired t-test post hoc tests was conducted to detect differences between conditions. Results: Participants exercised at a higher intensity and had higher intrinsic motivation in the two competitive conditions compared to visual feedback. Further, participants preferred the competitive conditions and only reached a vigorous exercise intensity during self-competition. Visual exploration was higher in visual feedback compared to self-competition. Conclusions: For young adults bicycling in VR, competition promoted higher exercise intensity and motivation compared to visual feedback.

Strabismus Screening Using Eyetracker Combined with Machine Learning

Purpose: To assess the effectiveness of an automated screening program that diagnoses horizontal strabismus using machine learning based on ocular deviation data captured by the wearable eyetracker, Tobii pro glasses 2 (TPG2).Methods: The TPG2 which locates the pupil center to measure ocular movement was used. In normal adults wearing TPG2, horizontal ocular deviation was induced by covering the left eye and applying prisms of varying strengths (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 12, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, and 40 PD base-in and out) to the right eye. TPG2 automatically recorded ocular deviation before and after prism induction generating 28 types of ocular deviation sets. From each set, 20 X-axis values before and after ocular deviation were randomly extracted using an oversampling technique creating a total of 61,600 ocular deviation sets. For training, 56,000 sets were used and 5,600 were evaluated for sensitivity, specificity, and area under the curve (AUC).Results: Eleven normal adults (5 males) participated with a mean age of 34.8 ± 7.37 years. Based on an 8 PD threshold, deviations of 8 PD or less demonstrated a sensitivity of 1.0, a specificity of 0.95, and an AUC of 0.97. When categorized into three groups based on 8 PD and 20 PD thresholds, the results were: sensitivity of 0.90 and specificity of 0.95 for ≤ 8 PD; sensitivity of 0.60 and specificity of 1.00 for 8-20 PD; sensitivity of 1.00 and specificity of 0.88 for > 20 PD.Conclusions: The machine learning program developed using induced ocular deviations measured with prisms and TPG2 shows promise for use in future strabismus screening tests.

Gaze of Kampo specialists during simulated dynamic abdominal examinations: A cross‐sectional study using a wearable eye tracker

AbstractAimWe aimed to clarify the characteristics of the Kampo specialists' gaze during Kampo abdominal examinations on simulated patients and obtain suggestions for improving medical students' gaze during Kampo medicine abdominal examinations.MethodsWe recorded and quantitatively evaluated the gazes of eight Kampo specialists and six medical students using a wearable eye tracker during abdominal examinations of simulated patients.ResultsWhen specific sites were observed during abdominal examinations, the Kampo specialists' gaze toward the simulated patient's face was significantly higher than that of the medical students (mean = 1.019, 95% highest density interval: 0.159–2.050). A significant difference was also observed between the two populations regarding the specific sites observed. The medical students' gaze durations toward the simulated patient's eyes (mean = −2.696; 95% highest density interval: −4.961 to −0.744), face (mean = −1.881; 95% highest density interval: −3.353 to −0.691), upper limbs (mean = −1.707; 95% highest density interval: −2.932 to −0.500), and lower limbs (mean = −2.555; 95% highest density interval: −4.730 to −0.654) were significantly longer than those of Kampo specialists.ConclusionsThe medical students' gazes were dispersed; those of Kampo specialists were focused and of short durations. These findings suggest that Kampo specialists quickly collect essential diagnostic information and look away from the patient's face to concentrate on considering the Kampo medicine diagnosis. Teaching Kampo specialists' gaze techniques in Kampo medicine education could lead to improvements in the gaze of medical students during abdominal examinations.

Exploring seafood choices at the point of purchase among a sample of Swedish consumers

PurposeSeafood consumption in Sweden is below the national recommendations and limited to very few species. This study aims to explore the factors shaping seafood choices at the point of purchase among a sample of current consumers in Sweden, and examines their attitudes regarding seafood consumption more broadly.Design/methodology/approachConvenience sampling was used to recruit consumers planning to purchase seafood at a supermarket in Sweden. Participants’ shopping trip was recorded using wearable eye tracking glasses and, upon completion, semi-structured interviews were conducted using a cued retrospective think aloud method. This exploratory study integrates qualitative data (N = 39) with eye tracking data (N = 34), to explore how seafood choices unfold when consumers purchase at the point of purchase.FindingsPurchases were mostly restricted to familiar seafood species. Four interlinked main themes were identified from thematic analysis of the interview data: Ambivalence, Nice and Necessary, Proficiency with Seafood and External Influences. Sustainability information (e.g. certifications) faced strong competition from other visual elements at the point of purchase, receiving less attention than product imagery and pricing information.Originality/valueThis study is the first to explore the factors shaping seafood choices of current consumers at the point of purchase. The unique approach, combining explicit and implicit measures, enriches understanding of the factors influencing seafood choices and how these may interrelate. The results are valuable for the industry and contribute to the literature by identifying possible routes to improve seafood sustainability communication.

Improving the Temporal Accuracy of Eye Gaze Tracking for the da Vinci Surgical System through Automatic Detection of Decalibration Events and Recalibration

Robust and accurate eye gaze tracking can advance medical telerobotics by providing complementary data for surgical training, interactive instrument control, and augmented human–robot interactions. However, current gaze tracking solutions for systems such as the da Vinci Surgical System (dVSS) are limited to complex hardware installations. Additionally, existing methods do not account for operator head movement inside the surgeon console, invalidating the original calibration. This work provides an initial solution to these challenges that can seamlessly integrate into console devices beyond the dVSS. Our approach relies on simple and unobtrusive wearable eye tracking glasses and provides calibration routines that can contend with operator-head movements. An external camera measures movement of the glasses through trackers mounted on the glasses to detect invalidation of the prior calibration from head movement and slippage. Movements beyond a threshold of 5 cm or 9ˆ∘ prompt another calibration sequence. In a study where users moved freely in the surgeon console after an initial calibration procedure, we show that our system tracks the eye tracking glasses to initiate recalibration procedures. Recalibration can reduce the mean tracking error up to 89% compared to the current prevailing approach which relies on the initial calibration only. This work is an important first step towards incorporating user movement into gaze-based applications for the dVSS.

Assessment of Pilots’ Cognitive Competency Using Situation Awareness Recognition Model Based on Visual Characteristics

Visual characteristics have the potential to assess the navigational proficiency of ship pilots. A precise assessment of ship piloting competence is imperative to mitigate human errors in piloting. An exhaustive examination of cognitive capabilities plays a pivotal role in developing an enhanced and refined system for classifying, selecting, and training ship piloting proficiency. Insufficiency in situation awareness (SA), denoting the cognitive underpinning of hazardous behaviors among pilots, may lead to subpar performance in ship pilotage when faced with adverse conditions. To address this issue, we propose an SA recognition model based on the random forest-support vector machine (RF-SVM) algorithm, which utilizes wearable eye-tracking technology to detect pilots’ at-risk cognitive state, specifically low-SA levels. We rectify the relative error (RE) and root mean square error (RMSE) and employ principal component analysis (PCA) to enhance the RF algorithm, optimizing the combination of salient features in greater depth. Through the utilization of these feature combinations, we construct a SVM algorithm using the most suitable variables for SA recognition. Our proposed RF-SVM algorithm is compared to RF or SVM alone, and it achieves the highest accuracy in recognizing at-risk cognitive states under poor visibility conditions (an improvement of 86.79% to 93.43% in accuracy). Taken collectively, the present findings offer vital technical support for developing a technique-based intelligent system for adaptively evaluating the cognitive accomplishment of pilots. Furthermore, they establish the groundwork and framework for the surveillance of cognitive processes and capabilities in marine pilotage operations within China.

Large eye–head gaze shifts measured with a wearable eye tracker and an industrial camera

We built a novel setup to record large gaze shifts (up to 140∘\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$^\\circ $$\\end{document}). The setup consists of a wearable eye tracker and a high-speed camera with fiducial marker technology to track the head. We tested our setup by replicating findings from the classic eye–head gaze shift literature. We conclude that our new inexpensive setup is good enough to investigate the dynamics of large eye–head gaze shifts. This novel setup could be used for future research on large eye–head gaze shifts, but also for research on gaze during e.g., human interaction. We further discuss reference frames and terminology in head-free eye tracking. Despite a transition from head-fixed eye tracking to head-free gaze tracking, researchers still use head-fixed eye movement terminology when discussing world-fixed gaze phenomena. We propose to use more specific terminology for world-fixed phenomena, including gaze fixation, gaze pursuit, and gaze saccade.

Simple Wearable Eye Tracker With Mini-Infrared Point Sensors

Simple Wearable Eye Tracker With Mini-Infrared Point Sensors

Evaluating the impact of Mind-wandering on driller's Situation awareness using wearable eye-tracking technology

Evaluating the impact of Mind-wandering on driller's Situation awareness using wearable eye-tracking technology

Evaluating the impact of mental workload on drillers' risk perception using wearable eye-tracking technology

Evaluating the impact of mental workload on drillers' risk perception using wearable eye-tracking technology

Measuring gaze angle changes to maintain fixation upon a small target during motion: 3D motion tracking versus wearable eye-tracker

Recently we demonstrated how changes in gaze angle can be determined without an eye-tracker. The approach uses 3D motion-capture, to track the viewed target in the head’s reference frame and assumes head or target movement causes a gaze-angle change. This study determined the validity of this “assumed-gaze” method. Participants read information presented on a smartphone whilst walking. Changes in gaze angles were simultaneously assessed with an eye-tracker and our assumed-gaze method. The spatial and temporal agreement of the assumed-gaze approach with the eye-tracker were ∼1 deg and ∼0.02 s, respectively, and spatial congruence indicated the direction of changes in the assumed-gaze angle were in accordance with those determined with the eye tracker for ∼81 % of the time. Findings indicate that when the head is moving and gaze is continually directed to a small target, our assumed-gaze approach can determine changes in gaze angle with comparable precision to a wearable eye-tracker.

Pupil Position by an Improved Technique of YOLO Network for Eye Tracking Application

This Eye gaze following is the real-time collection of information about a person's eye movements and the direction of their look. Eye gaze trackers are devices that measure the locations of the pupils to detect and track changes in the direction of the user's gaze. There are numerous applications for analyzing eye movements, from psychological studies to human-computer interaction-based systems and interactive robotics controls. Real-time eye gaze monitoring requires an accurate and reliable iris center localization technique. Deep learning technology is used to construct a pupil tracking approach for wearable eye trackers in this study. This pupil tracking method uses deep-learning You Only Look Once (YOLO) model to accurately estimate and anticipate the pupil's central location under conditions of bright, natural light (visible to the naked eye). Testing pupil tracking performance with the upgraded YOLOv7 results in an accuracy rate of 98.50% and a precision rate close to 96.34% using PyTorch.

Development of a Magnetoresistive-Based Wearable Eye-Tracking System for Oculomotor Assessment in Neurological and Otoneurological Research-Preliminary In Vivo Tests.

Over the past 20 years, several eye-tracking technologies have been developed. This article aims to present a new type of eye tracker capable of producing detailed information on eye and head movements using an array of magnetoresistive detectors fixed on the patient's head and a small magnet inserted into a contact lens, adapted to the curvature of the cornea of the subject. The software used for data analysis can combine or compare eye and head movements and can represent them as 2D or 3D images. Preliminary data involve an initial patient who was asked to perform several tasks to establish the accuracy, reliability, and tolerance of the magnetic eye tracker and software. The tasks included assessment of saccadic eye movements and pursuit, "drawing" alphabetic shapes or letters, and reading. Finally, a Head Impulse Test (HIT) was performed to estimate the VOR gain, comparing the standard deviation established via vHIT with that established via this magnetic eye tracker (mHIT). This prototypical device is minimally invasive, lightweight, relatively cheap, and tolerable, with a high degree of reliability and precision. All these characteristics could lead to the future use of the magnetic eye tracker in neurological and otoneurological fields.

Trial frame for evaluating eye movements.

Eye movement research is an established methodology and widely used in fundamental research fields such as psychology or neuroscience. Most research is performed in controlled environments with screen-based eye trackers, but demand for a wearable requirement is on the rise. Yet, a state of the art wearable eye tracking system thus far has not been feasible for subjects with refractive errors; therefore, a trial frame is proposed for researching the eye movement of people with or without refractive errors. Two iris cameras and several infrared radiation LEDs were fixed behind the frame for recording eye images. The images were sent to a host computer using 2.4G wireless, which was also fixed on the frame. The entire electronic system in the trial frame was driven using a battery. Eye position in the images was recognized and segmented by a model that was trained through machine learning. Then the pupil and blinks were detected from the segmented eye area using ellipse fitting and the eye aspect ratio. Experiments showed that the correct rate of pupil and blink detections were 97.24% and 96.14%, respectively.

Listener- Versus Speaker-Oriented Disfluencies in Autistic Adults: Insights From Wearable Eye-Tracking and Skin Conductance Within a Live Face-to-Face Paradigm.

Our study addresses three main questions: (a) Do autistics and neurotypicals produce different patterns of disfluencies, depending on the experimenter's direct versus averted gaze? (b) Are these patterns correlated to gender, skin conductance responses, fixations on the experimenter's face, alexithymia, or social anxiety scores? Lastly, (c) can eye-tracking and electrodermal activity data be used in distinguishing listener- versus speaker-oriented disfluencies? Within a live face-to-face paradigm combining a wearable eye-tracker with electrodermal activity sensors, 80 adults (40 autistics, 40 neurotypicals) defined words in front of an experimenter who was either staring at their eyes (direct gaze condition) or looking elsewhere (averted gaze condition). Autistics produce less listener-oriented (uh, um) and more speaker-oriented (prolongations, breath) disfluencies than neurotypicals. In both groups, men produce less um than women. Both autistics' and neurotypicals' speech are influenced by whether their interlocutor systematically looks at them in the eyes or not, but their reactions go in opposite directions. Disfluencies seem to primarily be linguistic phenomena as experienced stress, social attention, alexithymia, and social anxiety scores do not influence any of the reported results. Finally, eye-tracking and electrodermal activity data suggest that laughter could be a listener-oriented disfluency. This article studies disfluencies in a fine-grained way in autistic and neurotypical adults while controlling for social attention, experienced stress, and experimental condition (direct vs. averted gaze). It adds to current literature by (a) enlightening our knowledge of speech in autism, (b) opening new perspectives on disfluency patterns as important signals in social interaction, (c) addressing theoretical issues on the dichotomy between listener- and speaker-oriented disfluencies, and (d) considering understudied phenomena as potential disfluencies (e.g., laughter, breath). https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.23549550.

Individual Behavior and Attention Distribution during Wayfinding for Emergency Shelter: An Eye-Tracking Study

A fast evacuation from buildings to emergency shelters is necessary and important after the occurrence of a disaster. We investigated the variations in physical behaviors and cognition processes while finding emergency shelter. The on-site emergency-shelter-finding experiments were conducted in Beijing, China. Participants performed the task by using a wearable eye-tracking device. We aimed to assess three eye metrics: fixation counts, mean fixation duration, and visual attention index, to perform cognitive searching analysis for the environmental elements. The results showed that most people spend more fixation time on digital maps (297.77 ± 195.90 ms) and road conditions (239.43 ± 114.91 ms) than signs (150.90 ± 81.70 ms), buildings (153.44 ± 41.15 ms), and plants (170.11 ± 47.60 ms). Furthermore, most participants exhibit hesitation and retracing behaviors throughout the wayfinding process. The participants with relatively rich disaster experience and a proactive personality exhibit better performance in the shelter-finding task, such as a shorter retracing distance (p = 0.007) and nearer destination (p = 0.037). Eye metrics, together with the questionnaire, can mirror the complexity and heterogeneity of evacuation behavior during emergency shelter-finding. In addition, this also provides insights for the optimization of guidance sign systems and improvements in emergency management.

A Comparison of Night Hazard Detection between Younger and Older Drivers under Driving Simulation and Real-World Conditions

‘’Using eye-tracking technology, this study examined hazard detection at night. Using a 2 (younger versus older) x 2 (simulator versus on road) repeated-measures mixed design, 16 older adults and 17 younger adults drove their own vehicle and on a driving simulator under nighttime conditions wearing eye tracking technology. Both driving conditions had three roadway hazards of pedestrians looking at their cell phone while posed to cross the roadway. Pupil glances were recorded using outcome measures of total fixation duration, number of fixations, and time to first fixation. Results showed older adults detected hazards similarly to younger adults, especially during on-road performance. Night hazard detection was similar across driving conditions except for time to first fixation, which was faster on-road for both age groups. Results support potential use of driving simulators as a proxy for on-road with night driving needed for research and practice.

Improving higher education teaching with feedback of eye tracking glasses: An international and interdisciplinary study

The paper describes the purpose and the methods of the international project "Teaching in Higher Education Effectively via Eye-tracking" (THEE) and summarizes its findings. The project studied the eye movements of higher education teachers and students to reflect on how to improve the teaching-learning process. The participants were four professors and twelve students who wore eye tracking glasses during the lessons. The results of the study demonstrate a clear benefit of the approach based on collecting eye tracking data and teachers' self-reflection on their own classroom practice. Concerning the analysis of gaze location and teachers and students' behaviour, we noticed that the teachers looked mostly at the centre of the classroom and that the duration of the fixations depends on the size of the classroom and the type of subjects. Moreover, the teachers of scientific subjects seem to change their fixation duration distribution over the lessons analysed while the humanities lecturers appeared more static. The analyses also highlighted that the teachers of humanities subjects were found to be very focused on the cognitive processes, while teachers of scientific subjects were attentive to the way they can involve students in learning. On the other hand, students of the humanities mainly highlighted some operational factors related to the teacher's lesson and to their own subsequent study, whereas students of scientific subjects seemed to show more attention to the factors related to the lesson and to activities carried out in the classroom.

GlassesValidator: A data quality tool for eye tracking glasses

According to the proposal for a minimum reporting guideline for an eye tracking study by Holmqvist et al. (2022), the accuracy (in degrees) of eye tracking data should be reported. Currently, there is no easy way to determine accuracy for wearable eye tracking recordings. To enable determining the accuracy quickly and easily, we have produced a simple validation procedure using a printable poster and accompanying Python software. We tested the poster and procedure with 61 participants using one wearable eye tracker. In addition, the software was tested with six different wearable eye trackers. We found that the validation procedure can be administered within a minute per participant and provides measures of accuracy and precision. Calculating the eye-tracking data quality measures can be done offline on a simple computer and requires no advanced computer skills.

Problem-solving procedures in spatially explicit tasks: comparing procedures with printed and digital cartographic documents

Abstract The aim of this research study is to compare the procedures for solving geographical problems with printed and digital cartographic products. These documents are used in various areas of society, including regional development or visual communication in the media. A total of 27 probands participated in the research. Individuals were randomly divided into two groups, one group working with a printed atlas and the other with a digital atlas in the same version. Respondents were tested using stationary and wearable eye-trackers while completing a didactic test to determine different levels of map skills. The results of the research showed that although the procedures and the success rate for solving the different tasks did not differ between the two groups of respondents, the differences were mainly in the time needed for the solution and in the satisfaction in the use of a given type of cartographic work.