Capturing Reading Processes in Connected Texts with Eye Movements and a Letter Detection Task

Are printed words identified the same way when presented in isolation and in connected texts? In order to answer this central question in the psychology of reading, different techniques have been developed. Prominent among these techniques, eye movements have considerably contributed to our knowledge. Although a lot has been learned with eye movements, important complementary knowledge has also been gained with a simple letter detection task. More specifically, when readers are asked to cross off all occurrences of a designated target letter, they are more likely to miss it in frequent than in less frequent words, in function than in content words, in correctly spelled than in incorrectly spelled words, etc. Recently, the letter detection task has been combined with eye movements to produce a rich dataset going beyond the contribution of each technique when used in isolation. In this chapter, we review the literature on the cognitive processes involved in reading connected texts highlighted by the combined use of eye movements and the letter search task.