The effects of visual similarity on proofreading for misspellings
Proofreading Experiment 1 Introduction & method
Psych 311 lab
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Can You Read This?
Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, olny taht the frist and lsat ltteres are at the rghit pcleas. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by ilstef, but the wrod as a wlohe.
Read the following sentence slowly…
FROZEN FOODS ARE THE RESULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIFIC STUDY AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF REFRIGERATION
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Now count the F’s in the sentence. Count only once.
How many F’s did you find?
?
How many F’s did you find?
Four?
Correct answer is seven!
FROZEN FOODS ARE THE RESULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIFIC STUDY AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF REFRIGERATION
Proofreading
Many people required to proofread something they have written
As students, we do this OFTEN!
Even word processors and spell check don’t catch everything.
Very few people can do with 100% accuracy
Why Can’t We Proofread Accurately?
Simultaneous occurrence of two complex tasks
Reading AND detecting errors is difficult
Perceptual factors
Frsit Eamxlpe
Social media does not place an emphasis on proofreading
Exposure to perfect copies causes us to take them for granted
(Wong, 1973)
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Perceptual factors
If comprehension id satisfied we move one. Only when it is not do we stop.
Proofreading
What factors influence our proofreading abilities?
External/Personal
noise level, fatigue, spelling ability, eyesight
Internal/Cognitive factors
Perception:
Visually closer
o instead of c
Phonetically closer
werk instead of work
Mistakes that are visually closer to the correct spelling are easier to miss
Other research on proofreading strategies?
Riefer (1991;1993)
Backwards reading
Actually worse than normal reading
But, reading speed might be a factor
Team proofreading
One person reads out loud to a partner who follows along silently
Results showed more mistakes were found in the team condition
However, two people working separately on the same passage vs. one person looking at the passage gave same results
Our current study
Reading out loud vs. reading silently
Advantages of reading out loud
Slows you down
Recite every syllable
Will help detect phonological anomalies
Hypothesis
Reading out loud vs. reading silently
Which one is the effective proofreading strategy?
Specifically, in detecting spelling errors –
Aloud > Silent
Participants
Recruitment process
The convenience sampling method
Total sample size,
Demographic information – (report whatever data were collected)
Gender, age (report the M and SD for each category, if available)
(Ethnicity) (report %)
English-proficiency – (report %)
E.G., “Among participants, 30% identified as Latino, 25% ….”
No incentives were offered to participants in this study.
All participants were treated according to the ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct (American Psychological Association, 2002)
What did you use?: Materials
Two sets of booklets consisted of 4 materials:
Informed Consent – for permission
Demographic information sheet – what did you collect here?
General instruction – what does this explain?
Four passages (describe the content and the alteration made here)
Where did it come from?
What were there?
What was the order?
Why change in order? (counterbalanced to reduce carryover effect.)
Debriefing Statement – what was this?
Describe each material thoroughly.
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What did you do?: Procedure
Describe step by step (story) of the data collection
The Participants vs. Participants (don’t use a participant or my participant)
Participants were individually tested in a quiet setting.
Given the consent
Collected demographic information
Read general instruction
Provided four testing passages
Debriefed and thanked
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Design and Data Analysis
A within subject design
The independent variable was … with two levels: ______ and _____.
The dependent variable was…
Analysis – correlated t-test at p < .05
Your Responsibility
Each student will be responsible for collecting data from one individual (family, friend, coworker)
Conduct your experiment in a quiet place, free from distractions and interruptions
Choose a participant who will take it seriously and perform to the best of their ability
Read all instructions to the participant carefully, and allow the participant to have any questions answered before they begin
Provide a writing utensil