Eye movements during visual search and memory search

Required 9 college students to 1st fixate a set of 1, 2, or 3 standard (memory) alphabetic characters and then to scan 12 comparison characters for 1 that matched a standard. Effects of surrounding standard characters and comparison characters with visual noise were also evaluated. Visual noise exerted independent effects upon standard and comparison set characters. In both cases, encoding times, as measured by fixation durations, increased with the addition of visual noise, but comparison times were unaffected. Fixation durations increased on comparison characters when Ss had to search for more than 1 standard. Memory search rate was about the same on each successively fixated comparison character. Time to encode each comparison character was proportional to its vertical distance from the previously fixated one. (28 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved). © 1973 American Psychological Association.