Investigation To The Advanced Chinese Reading Patterns Of Foreign Students By Eye Tracker

In this thesis, the narrative articles in Chinese on advanced level were selected as the experimental reading-materials of Chinese as foreign language. The advanced Chinese as foreign language reading patterns of foreign students were investigated and discussed based on the data conducted and recorded by eye tracker. Those data were also further analyzed and studied on the cognitive and acquisitive theories, compared with the results from Chinese native students.In the introduction section, the research significance and contents of this thesis, were reviewed and reported. In this thesis, five significant topics on Chinese reading patterns of foreign students with advanced reading level, such as reading level, eye-movement characteristics of reading, language consciousness, cognitive patterns of reading and metacognition skills, have been discussed. Additionally, the cognitive and acquisitive theories related to the analysis and discussion in the thesis, were summarized.In the experimental section, the experimental process was detailedly described. 14 parameters that can scientifically and effectively characterize and evaluate the basic eye-movements for Chinese as foreign language reading, were introduced respectively. These 14 parameters include: answering marks, reading speed, reading efficiency, reading duration, fixation duration, fixation count, fixation frequency, saccade amplitude, fixation span, saccade speed, blink count, re-gression count, reading pattern, pupil diameter. Most of above parameters can be measured and recorded by eye tracker. The eye tracker is modeled EyeLinkⅡTracker, produced by SR Research Ltd. Canada.The data were recorded by eye tracker from foreign students when they were presented with the narrative articles written in Chinese. All foreign students have studied and learned Chinese language for more than 500 hours. They are studying in the Advanced Class with HSK 7 to 8 levels. We thank them for their excellent performance. All data were statistically processed with software. The experimental results and data were analyzed carefully. First of all, the reading levels were evaluated and analyzed according to the statistic results of answering marks, reading speed and comprehension efficiency. Secondly, the parameters related to fixation, saccade, re-gression and pupil changes when reading, were involved in the study of eye-movement characteristics of Chinese reading of foreign students. Thirdly, the articles were divided into different information areas in order to study the memory ability, comprehension ability and logic inference ability of foreign students. Furthermore, the fixations on the areas in front of or behind the verbs in sentences, on the function words, on the characters and words appearing with high and low frequencies in the articles, on the complexity of Chinese character strokes, and on the different spaces in the articles, were statistically analyzed and classified respectively.In the discussion section, based on the statistics and analysis of above data, it is concluded that there is much different (1-3 times) in the reading factors and indexes conducted by eye tracker comparing between foreign students and Chinese native students even though they have similar age, knowledge level and individual background.Contrast to Chinese students, foreign students focus on the advanced and difficult level Chinese characters and words for longer fixation duration and more fixation count, meantime, the details in the articles were neglected when reading. It is notable that foreign students with advanced reading level, emphasize and pay attention to Chinese character fixation, as a result, the reading speed is reduced, while, Chinese students are more interested in Chinese words and word groups. Foreign students pay more attention to the advanced and difficult characters and words, while, Chinese students are more interested in middle level Chinese character and words, and neglect the advanced ones. Additionally, the complexity of Chinese characters strokes is also an important factor affecting reading speed. Those indicate that the observations and conclusions could be applied in providing experimental and direct evidences to improve and develop the teaching theory and practice in Chinese as foreign language.It is measured that the average reading speed of foreign students, is 218 characters per minute, reaching the standard of advanced reading level required by the Chinese Language Council of China. Foreign students prefer directly read line by line and make a re-gression in one line。This presents their advanced reading level and good reading experience. Foreign students on this level have certain language consciousness. They usually neglect and lose some important grammar information in the articles though they have more fixations on function words, for instance, they are not very sensitive to verbs. This implies that emphasizing the understanding to the verbs in reading is significant to teach Chinese as foreign language.Foreign students'fixation points in a sentence could not be well corresponded with the information structure of the sentence, indicating that foreign students with advanced reading level have not the ability of effectively and completely understanding the information structure of a Chinese sentence. So it is necessary to increase the analytical ability of information structure in Chinese sentence and articles in teaching foreign students Chinese as foreign language.Finally, this thesis mentioned some related topics need to be further explored based on experimental and theoretical work in the future.