Parafoveal Processing of Orthographic, Phonological, and Semantic Information from Chinese Characters at a Distant Position: A Parafoveal Priming Study

TL;DR

Chinese readers can process the shape and meaning of distant characters but not their sounds while reading.

Contribution

This study reveals the specific types of information processed from distant characters during Chinese reading.

Findings

Orthographically similar distant previews slow target character recognition.

Semantically related distant previews speed up target character recognition.

Phonological information is not extracted from distant parafoveal positions.

Abstract

Previous research has shown that the perceptual span in Chinese reading extends three characters to the right of the fixation point. However, little is known regarding the types of preview information that can be extracted from such a distant position; namely, the character at the N + 3 position. Using the parafoveal priming paradigm combined with eye-tracking technology, we manipulated the preview type and preview duration to examine whether Chinese readers could extract orthographic, phonological, and semantic information from the character at the N + 3 position across three experiments. Experiment 1 revealed an orthographic preview cost: orthographically similar previews delayed the target character recognition compared to unrelated previews. Experiment 2 showed no evidence of phonological preview effects. Experiment 3 demonstrated a semantic preview benefit: semantically related previews significantly facilitated the target character recognition relative to unrelated previews. Taken together, these findings indicate that Chinese readers are able to extract orthographic and semantic, but not phonological, information from a distant parafoveal position.

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