ALBRECHT INHOFFProfessor of Psychology
Coordinator, Graduate Program in Cognitive Psychology
Ph.D., University of Massachusetts at Amherst
Post-doctoral fellowships: Good Samaritan Hospital, Portland; University of Oregon with Michael Posner
Areas: Cognitive Psychology; Behavioral Neuroscience
E-mail: inhoff@binghamton.edu
Phone: 607-777-3958
Office: Science IV, Room 114
Curriculum vitae (.pdf, 174.3kb)
Ad-hoc reviewer for a dozen journals and several granting agencies, editorial board member, visiting professor with teaching and research in China and Germany. Chair of the Department of Psychology.
Center for Cognitive and Psycholinguistic Sciences (CAPS)
Word recognition; attention and eye movement control in reading and typing; eye-hand coordination
Encoding of visual text differs fundamentally from the encoding of spoken language in that it requires the active selection of to-be-recognized words from a spatially ordered set of visual symbols. My research examines the coordination of two mechanisms, overt and covert selection of words in reading. Covert selection precedes overt selection. It involves the inhibition of previously attended areas of text (inhibition of return) and the active orienting toward new words. Covert selection and linguistic processing can encompass more than one word at a time, and it guides overt selection, i.e., movements of eyes, to new text. My recent work examines counter-directional eye movements, how and when readers move the eyes to previously read text (regressions). Although the direction of large regressions is opposite to word order, they rarely disrupt reading. Our results show that readers can represent word order independent of when a particular word is viewed during sentence reading so that the temporal succession of viewed words does not completely determine the linguistic order of represented word. I also examine covert (inner) articulation of words during reading and how this process keeps a word word briefly active after the eyes have moved on to another word.
My research is conducted in a state of the art laboratory. Most experiments involve the measurement of eye movements with relatively high spatial and temporal accuracy. We assume that movements of the eyes during reading are tightly controlled by ongoing perceptual and cognitive processes. Measurement of eye movements thus provides us with a direct, on-line index of mental processes during fluent reading.
Many of our laboratory techniques involve the creation of sophisticated and often spectacular viewing conditions. This includes the creation of artificial scotomas and tunnel-vision. We have recently developed a new experimental technique, the contingent speech technique, that allows us to present auditory information (via headphones) when the eyes reach a pre-determined word during reading. Effects of visual and auditory manipulations on eye movements during sentence reading are then be used to determine whether, when, and how a particular type of information is used during silent reading.
*Wang, C.A., Tzeng, O.J.L., Inhoff, A.W., & Tsai, J.-L. (in press). Acquisition of Linguistic Information to the left of fixation during the reading of Chinese. Language and Cognitive Processes.
Eiter, B. & Inhoff, A.W. (in press). Visual word recognition is accompanied by covert articulation: Evidence for a speech-like phonological representation. Psychological Research.
Inhoff, A.W., Solomon, M., Seymour, B., & Radach, R. (2008). Eye position changes during reading fixations are spatially selective. Vision Research,48, 1027-1039. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.visres.2008.01.012
Inhoff, A.W., Solomon, M., Starr, M., & Placke, L. (2008). Eye movements during the reading of compound words and the influence of lexeme meaning. Memory & Cognition, 36, 675-687.
Weger, U.W. & Inhoff, A.W. (2007). Long-range regressions to previously read words are guided by spatial and verbal memory. Memory & Cognition, 35, 1293-1306.
