ALIGNING METHOD

PURPOSE:To enable alignment with high accuracy at higher speed by obtaining correction positional data for aligning each region of succeeding substrates at specified places in order on the basis of a detecting mark signal and controlling the movement of the succeeding substrates on the basis of the correction positional data. CONSTITUTION:Luminous flux reflected from a wafer mark M forms the image of the wafer mark M on the image pickup surface of an image pickup device 5 through an image formation optical system 4. The place of an address having the highest degree of matching with a template pattern previously stored to the linear digital signal row output from an integrator 7 is output to a CPU 9. The certainty of the quantity of the place displaced of a sample letected by the position sensor 8 is determined by fuzzy inference. The CPU 9 moves an XY stage 11 so that the measuring mark M of a second measurement shot is kept within the range of the visual field of an alignment optical system S, and acquires the quantity of the place displaced of the sample and the certainty of the quantity of the place displaced.