Eye movements are a reflection of cognitive processes

Introduction

The mind is an intriguing element of the human life not only because of its complexity and capability but mostly because of its opacity. How does psychology begin to understand something so obscure and complex? Evidently, by observing and measuring the product of the cognitive processes that occurs through an interaction between the external and internal world.

The term ‘cognitive processes’ is a rather collective term referring to a range of mental processes such as perceiving, thinking, speaking, acting, planning and imagining (Ward, 2006). The processes themselves are immensely difficult to measure directly, if possible at all. However, one may gain insight into these mental processes through observing the covert products, such as haemodynamic and electrophysiological changes and the overt products, such as behaviour, accuracy, response times and eye movements. The scope of this essay is to review the evidence that demonstrates exactly how eye movements reflect cognitive processes. Due to the vastness of the topic, this essay will focus on only one of the aforementioned cognitive processes. There has been much attention and extensive literature and reviews regarding eye movements as a tool for understanding the processes of reading, visual perception, visual search and attention (e.g., Rayner, 1998; Liversedge and Findlay, 2000; Schutz, Braun and Gegenfurtner, 2011). All the mentioned research fields involve measuring eye movements while view some form of visual stimulus, this dissertation will explore a more aberrant field, evidence will be based on literature relating to eye movements when sensory visual input is absent, during visual mental imagery.

While reviewing the literature basic themes relating eye m...

... middle of paper ...

...nformation processing: 20 years of research. Psychological Bulletin, 124, 372-422.

Schutz, A.C., Braun, D.I., & Gegenfurtner, K.R. (2011). Eye movements and perception: A selective review. Journal of Vision, 5, 1-30.

Shallice,T. (1988). From neuropsychology to mental structure. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Sima, J.F., Lindner, M., Schultheis, H., & Barkowsky, T. (2010). Eye movements reflect reasoning with mental images but not with mental models in orientation knowledge tasks. Spatial Cognition, 10, 248-261.

Spivey, M.J., & Geng, J.J. (2001). Oculomotor mechanisms activated by imagery and memory: eye movements to absent objects. Psychological Research, 65, 235-241.

Ward, J. (2006). The students guide to cognitive neuroscience. New York: Psychology Press.

Watson, J.B. (1913). Psychology as the behaviourist views it. Psychological Review, 20, 158-177.