The Role of Syllables and Morphemes in Silent Reading: An Eye-tracking Study

Overview

Journal Q J Exp Psychol (Hove)

Specialties Psychiatry
Psychology

Date 2023 Feb 21

PMID 36803303

Authors

Elisabetta De Simone

Kristina Moll

Lisa Feldmann

Xenia Schmalz

Elisabeth Beyersmann

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

German skilled readers have been found to engage in morphological and syllable-based processing in visual word recognition. However, the relative reliance on syllables and morphemes in reading multi-syllabic complex words is still unresolved. This study aimed to unveil which of these sublexical units are the preferred units of reading by employing eye-tracking technology. Participants silently read sentences while their eye-movements were recorded. Words were visually marked using colour alternation (Experiment 1) or hyphenation (Experiment 2)-at syllable boundary (e.g., ), at morpheme boundary (e.g., ), or within the units themselves (e.g., ). A control condition without disruptions was used as a baseline (e.g., ). The results of Experiment 1 showed that eye-movements were not modulated by colour alternations. The results of Experiment 2 indicated that hyphens disrupting syllables had a larger inhibitory effect on reading times than hyphens disrupting morphemes, suggesting that eye-movements in German skilled readers are more influenced by syllabic than morphological structure.

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