MRI: Acquisition of an Infrared Eye Tracker to Study the Emergence, Use, Loss and Reacquisition of Communication Skills

利用国家科学基金会颁发的重大仪器奖，Rhiannon Luyster博士和艾默生学院的三名合作研究人员将从SensoMotoric Instruments购买远程眼动跟踪(RED)系统。通过使用红外线，红色系统允许用户记录眼睛的运动和对图像或视频的凝视；这项技术已被广泛应用于各种学科，以了解视觉图像的哪些方面吸引了观众的注意。这四名合作研究人员是传播科学和疾病学系的教员，他们计划使用这项先进技术来研究沟通技能在整个生命周期中的出现、使用、丧失和重新获得。一项研究探索了对说话面孔的视觉注意在幼儿语言学习和语言缺陷中的作用。第二项研究解决了儿童如何用视觉扫描患有自闭症和不患有自闭症的同龄人的面部表情，以及这些视觉扫描模式与自闭症儿童在社交尝试中感觉到的笨拙之间的关系。最后一组项目研究了失语症成年人在试图理解信息时如何使用语言和非语言沟通渠道，以及失语症成年人的潜在沟通伙伴如何依赖语言和非语言渠道来理解失语症患者。总而言之，这一研究项目有可能揭示沟通在从幼儿到成年人的一生中所扮演的角色。目的是回答关于交际线索的价值，以及交际线索使用的差异如何与缺陷相关的核心问题，或者反过来，支持健康发展。该设备将为艾默生学院的教师奖学金、学生学习和社区参与带来广泛的好处。首先，除了与这项提议相关的四名教职员工外，整个学院的几名教职员工都表示有兴趣将眼球跟踪技术融入他们的工作中，涵盖从跨文化消费者行为到媒体在新闻中的作用等主题。其次，这些设备将提供给来自任何大学系的本科生和硕士学生，其中许多(例如市场营销)培养的毕业生将在专业领域接触到眼球跟踪技术。最后，购买这些设备将加强艾默生学院目前的外展计划，包括与波士顿地区女生科学俱乐部(将科学领域的大学生与代表性不足群体中的中小学生联系起来)、波士顿科学博物馆和剑桥科学节的现有合作伙伴关系，在这些活动中，我们的学生向众多不同的受众展示关于科学和科学教育的文章。最后，艾默生传播学院最近开始录制一系列播客，展示其教职员工的研究计划和创新。这些播客在不同的背景下播出，包括在艾默生旗下的WERS电台上播出，从而传播有关艾默生的眼球跟踪研究、最新发现和科学在我们社会中的价值的信息。

Using a Major Instrumentation award from the National Science Foundation, Dr. Rhiannon Luyster and three co-investigators at Emerson College will purchase a Remote Eye Tracking (RED) System from Sensomotoric Instruments. By using infrared light, the RED system allows users to record eye movements and fixations to images or videos; this technology has been used across a wide range of disciplines to learn about what aspects of visual images attract a viewer's attention. The four collaborating investigators are faculty in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders and plan to use this advanced technology to study the emergence, use, loss and reacquisition of communication skills across the lifespan. One study explores the role of visual attention to speaking faces in early childhood language learning and language deficits. A second study addresses how children visually scan the facial expressions of peers with and without autism and how these visual scan patterns relate to the perception of awkwardness in the social communication attempts of children with autism. A final set of projects studies how adults with aphasia attend to verbal and non-verbal communication channels when trying to understand messages and how potential communication partners of adults with aphasia rely on verbal and non-verbal channels to understand people with aphasia. Together, this program of research has the potential to reveal new insights into the role of communication across the lifespan, from young children to adults. The goal is to answer core questions about the value of communicative cues, and how variations in the use of communicative cues might be associated with deficits, or, conversely, support healthy development. This equipment will have broad benefits for faculty scholarship, student learning and community engagement at Emerson College. First, in addition to the four faculty associated with the present proposal, several faculty members throughout the college have expressed an interest in incorporating eye-tracking technology into their own work, covering topics from cross-cultural consumer behavior to the role of media in journalism. Second, the equipment will be made available to undergraduate and masters students from any college department, many of which (Marketing, for instance) produce graduates who will encounter eye-tracking technology in the professional world. Finally, the acquisition of this equipment will strengthen current Emerson College outreach programs, including an existing partnership with the Boston-area Science Club for Girls (connecting college students in the sciences with elementary and middle-school aged girls from underrepresented groups), the Boston Museum of Science, and the Cambridge Science Festival, where our students present pieces on science and science education to a large and diverse audience. Finally, the School of Communication at Emerson recently began recording a series of podcasts to showcase the research programs and innovations of its faculty. These podcasts are aired in a variety of contexts, including on WERS - the Emerson-owned radio station - thus disseminating information about Emerson's eye-tracking research, recent findings and the value of science in our society.