Johan Van Rensbergen

Watching Subtitled Television Automatic Reading Behavior

When foreign movies are subtitled in the local language, reading subtitles is more or less obligatory. Our previous studies have shown that knowledge of the foreign language or switching off the sound track does not affect the total time spent in the subtitled area. Long-standing familiarity with subtitled movies and processing efficiency have been suggested as explanations. Their effects were tested by comparing American and Dutch-speaking subjects who differ in terms of subtitling familiarity. In Experiment 1, American subjects watched an American movie with English subtitles. Despite their lack of familiarity with subtitles, they spent considerable time in the subtitled area. Accordingly, subtitle reading cannot be due to habit formation from long-term experience. In Experiment 2, a movie in Dutch with Dutch subtitles was shown to Dutch-speaking subjects. They also looked extensively at the subtitles, suggesting that reading subtitles is preferred because of efficiency in following and understanding the movie. However, the same findings can also be explained by the more dominant processing of the visual modality. The proportion of time spent reading subtitles is consistently larger with two-line subtitles than with one-line subtitles. Two explanations are provided for the differences in watching one- and two-line subtitles: (a) the length expectation effect on switching attention between picture and text and (b) the presence of lateral interference within two lines of text.

Reading a message when the same message is available auditorily in another language the case of subtitling

In Experiment 1 , subjects reported on the speed of three presentation times of subtitles (4-, 6- and 8-seconds rules), with the 6-seconds rule as the one used by most TV stations (normal presentation time). In Experiment 2 , three time rules (2-, 4- and 6-seconds rule) were used in three different tapes of the same movie and the eye movements were recorded. Subjects did or did not master the spoken language; a third group did not receive the sound track. The findings suggest that, under normal presentation time, time spent in reading the subtitle does not change as a function of the knowledge and the availability of the spoken language, due to the longstanding experiences of our subjects with such a presentation time. A number of episodic effects of the movie are to be explained by their confounding with the number of lines in the subtitle: As the time to switch from the movie to the subtitle is more or less the same in all cases, more viewing time is available with two lines. In general, processing of subtitles seems to be an automatic or “encapsulated” activity, at least if it is not disturbed by abnormal presentation times.

Film Perception: The Processing of Film Cuts

Publisher Summary The chapter describes three levels of editing errors. Editing errors of the first order refer either to small displacements of the camera position or to small changes of the image size, disturbing the perception of apparent movement, and leading to the impression of jumping. Editing rules of the second order are based on the ability of the perceiver to construe a spatial-cognitive schema of the displayed scene. An editing error implies a switch in the left–right location of the objects in the scene. Third order editing rules are meant to reinforce the narrative continuity of the story, in other words the maintenance/steadiness of “visual momentum”. The viewer is unaware that much processing is going on to produce a smooth perception of a large sequence of discontinuous events. The viewers perception of a movie is typically experienced as a continuous one. This is achieved by the principle that “successive shots should try to minimize perceptually disruptive transitions”. Effects of these disruptive transitions are deliberately introduced in this chapter and eye movements of the perceivers (test subjects) are recorded to analyze collected data.

13 Developmental Studies of Text-Picture Interactions in the Perception of AnimatedCartoons with Text

Publisher Summary This chapter presents developmental studies of text–picture interactions in the perception of animated cartoons with text. Single items may be coded directly in a dual way, with verbal and nonverbal (imagery) codes. These codes interact at different stages of their processing and retrieval. Text-picture interaction research has focused mainly on showing how pictures illustrate and facilitate prose learning, with the goal of rendering a verbal text more concrete, more coherent, more comprehensible, and accordingly more memorable. Pictures are only intended to support the verbal context and are, therefore, subordinated to the verbal message. In some cases, pictures complement the text; in others, they aid in the interpretation of the text. Much human activity, however, is based on the perception of dynamic situations with stationary and moving objects, and also with people interacting verbally. Daily information-processing activities are directed at the perception of pictorial episodes intertwined with verbal interactions and messages between people.

On-line control of moving masks and windows on a complex background using the ATVista videographics adapter

In reading research, the moving mask and moving window paradigms have proved to be invaluable in determining the chronometric and spatial characteristics of processing written text. The success of these methods has lead to a demand for their application in research on real-world scene perception. However, we will argue that the technical implementation of eye-contingent mask (window) movement across a stable text cannot be applied to scene research. A new technique is proposed that allows graphical masks or windows of arbitrary form, size, and content to be moved quickly over a complex graphical stimulus. Thismoving overlay technique makes use of the ATVista graphics adapter, a board with the ability to mix an internally stored and an externally generated image into one composite image. A high-performance moving mask or window is created by programming the internal image to be movable and partly transparent. The technique is implemented on a standard personal computer interfaced with an eyetracker, thus bringing mask (window) movement under online eye-movement control. We discuss general principles of the technique and illustrate them with performance data from a concrete experimental setup.

Graphical versus character-based word processors: an analysis of user performance

Abstract The study investigates how experienced computer users take advantage of the availability of graphic user interfaces in a word processing task. Performance time and actions were compared in three groups of subjects working respectively with WordPerfect 5.1, WordPerfect for Windows, or WordPerfect V2.00 for the Macintosh. The three groups did not differ in efficiency: they performed the word processing task at the same speed. Very few WordPerfect 5.1 users worked with the pull-down menus; the great majority preferred using the function key shortcuts. No significant difference in menu use was noted between the two graphical user interface word processors (Windows and Macintosh). Windows users did not apply shortcuts to move text, but used menus or the button bar instead. There was no difference in the use of the mouse between the Windows and Macintosh groups. While better task satisfaction is often reported with the availability of graphical user interfaces, our findings are in agreement with other ...

Transsaccadic integration of biological motion: Overview and further evidence based on reaction times

Abstract In a transsaccadic integration paradigm, subjects had to detect saccade-contingent changes in a moving point-light walker. Verfaillie, De Troy, and Van Rensbergen (in press) provide a detailed description of the study. In the present article, we offer an overview and discuss converging evidence based on an analysis of the reaction times. In general, the reaction time to detect a display change decreased as the metric size of the change increased, whereas the time to decide that there was no change increased as the change became larger. First, changes in the relative positions of the limbs of the walker were detected fairly accurately. Moreover, the postsaccadic relative positions seemed to be anticipated across saccades. Second, the global image-plane position of the walker was not maintained accurately across saccades. Third, saccade-contingent changes in the walkers in-depth orientation were readily noticed. This suggests that transsaccadic object representations are position invariant but orientation dependent.

An artificial eye for evaluating videobased eye recording systems

Videobased corneal-reflection-to-pupil-center systems are widely used in eye movement research. In this paper, an artificial eye drawn on a computer screen is presented. The artificial eye provides a way to simulate measurements of eye position in human subjects. The method allows testing videobased systems on the level of the signal and on the level of the calibration algorithm used to map the eye position parameters to stimulus space. In addition, the artificial eye can be used to evaluate specific hypotheses concerning the functioning or malfunctioning of the eye recorder and as a help in developing data analysis programs.