English
РусскийOculomotor Activity of the Russian Learners of English During the Perception of Verbal Stimuli in Russian and English Languages
Abstract
Utilising modern technologies in second language acquisition (SLA) studies widens the horizon for the researchers in this field. EEG, PET, fMRI and eye-tracking give an opportunity to investigate the processes involved in SLA which are concealed from the researchers. In the last decade eye-trackers have become more available, which has given a rise to the number of studies conducted with the use of this equipment. We used eye movement measures of first-language and second-language text reading to investigate peculiarity of oculomotor activity which the Russian learners of English demonstrate during the perception of verbal stimuli in Russian and English languages. The data show that the mechanisms of oculomotor activity during the perception of texts in English and Russian are different. It is found that fixation count and fixation frequency have maximum values for the text in Russian and these values are closer to the ones registered during the image perception. Saccade count and saccade frequency demonstrate maximum values during the perception of the text in English. Moreover, the study shows that some learners’ peculiarities of neuro- and psychodynamics correlate with the certain characteristics of the oculomotor activity registered during the perception of the stimuli in different languages.
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