Dr. Sarah J. White
Associate Professor
PhD Durham University
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Research group: | Vision and Language |
| Email: | s.j.white@le.ac.uk | |
| Tel: | +44 (0)116 229 7181 | |
| Fax: | +44 (0)116 229 7196 | |
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Room 4.16 |
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Personal details
PhD Durham University
Professional activities
- Member of the Experimental Psychology Society
- Fellow of the Psychonomic Society
- Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
Publications
- Warrington, K.L., McGowan, V.A., Paterson, K.B., & White, S.J. (2019). Effects of adult aging on letter position coding in reading: Evidence from eye movements. Psychology and Aging, 34, 598-612.
- Warrington, K.L., McGowan, V.A., Paterson, K.B., & White, S.J. (2018). Effects of aging, word frequency and text stimulus quality on reading across the adult lifespan: Evidence from eye movements. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 44, 1714-1729.
- White, S.J., Drieghe, D., Liversedge, S.P., & Staub, A. (2018). The word frequency effect during sentence reading: A linear or nonlinear effect of log frequency? Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 71, 46-55.
- White, S.J., Lantz, L.M.T., & Paterson, K.B. (2017). Spontaneous rereading within sentences: Eye movement control and visual sampling. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 43, 395-413.
- White, S.J., Warrington, K.L., McGowan, V.A., & Paterson, K.B. (2015). Eye movements during reading and topic scanning: Effects of word frequency. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 41, 233-248.
- McGowan, V.A., White, S.J., Jordan, T.R., & Paterson, K.B. (2014). Aging and the use of inter-word spaces during reading: Evidence from eye movements. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 21, 740-747.
- Reichle, E.D., Liversedge, S.P., Drieghe, D., Blythe, H.I., Joseph, H.S.S.L., White, S.J., & Rayner, K. (2013). Using E-Z Reader to examine the concurrent development of eye-movement control and reading skill. Developmental Review, 33, 110-149.
- White, S.J., & Staub, A. (2012). The distribution of fixation durations during reading: Effects of stimulus quality. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 38, 603-617.
- White, S.J., Warren, T., & Reichle, E.D. (2011). Parafoveal preview during reading: Effects of sentence position. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 37, 1221-1238.
- Staub, A., White, S.J., Drieghe, D., Hollway, E.C., & Rayner, K. (2010). Distributional effects of word frequency on eye fixation durations. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 36, 1280-1293.
- Warren, T., White, S.J., & Reichle, E.D. (2009). Investigating the causes of wrap-up effects: Evidence from eye movements and E-Z Reader. Cognition, 111, 132-137.
- White, S. J. (2008). Eye movement control during reading: Effects of word frequency and orthographic familiarity. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 34, 205-223.
- White, S.J., Bertram, R, & Hyönä, J. (2008). Semantic processing of previews within compound words. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory & Cognition, 34, 988-993.
- White, S.J., Johnson, R.L., Liversedge, S.P., & Rayner, K. (2008). Eye movements when reading transposed text: The importance of word beginning letters. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 34, 1261-1276.
Research
Key research topics:
- Eye movement control during reading
- Parafoveal processing
- Visual word recognition
- Cross-linguistic differences in reading eye movement behaviour
At any one time, we can only view a small part of the text in detail, so we move our eyes in order to provide a series of visually detailed snapshots that we then cleverly integrate together. I am particularly interested in how we process text before it is fixated (parafoveal processing) and the mechanisms underlying what controls the movements of our eyes as we read. The research helps us understand how the visual, linguistic, attention control and oculomotor mechanisms are inter-related. I am also interested in the flexibility (e.g. effect of reading goals) and development (e.g. older readers) of these mechanisms.
I would be interested in supervising PhD study in any of the areas listed above. Learn more about how to apply here.
