Latency of sequential eye movements: Implications for reading

Available estimates indicate that the average minimum latency of saccadic eye movements (175-200 msec) approaches the mean duration of fixations in reading (200-250 msec). This fact presents a problem for models of reading that assume that an eye movement is initiated only after substantial information is processed on a fixation. Three experiments with the same 4 experienced observers are reported that support earlier estimates of saccadic latency; the experiments were conducted under conditions in which the length of measured latencies could not reflect a motoric refractory period, spatial uncertainty, or temporal uncertainty. (33 ref)