Background. Visual attention in video games is a relatively underdeveloped field, especially so when it comes to colorblind accessibility. According to recent research, there is an increased social demand for options to alleviate problems colorblind individuals experience in video games. Finding simple and effective ways to achieve visual attention, which work well for both colorblind individuals and non-colorblind individuals simultaneously, would therefore be beneficial to the video game industry. Objectives. The objectives of this thesis were to analyze the effectiveness of three already utilized methods for achieving visual attention in video games and how their effectiveness differs when seen from a trichromatic or dichromatic perspective. The selected methods are animation, color, and outline. These are commonly used in video games, not only for the sake of attention but also for design in general. By testing each method individually and combined with color it is possible to analyze their effectiveness and how it differs when seen from different color perspectives. Methods. In order to gather the data required, an eye-tracking experiment with a sample size of 20 participants was conducted. The experiment showed scenes consisting of either a control background or game-inspired background. The scenes contained two objects which had color, animation, outline, animation combined with color, or outline combined with color applied to them. This experiment was performed on campus, so the primary group tested were students. The eye-tracker analyzed the participant's eye movements and together with areas of interest, it provided two different metrics: time to first fixation and total fixation duration. Results. The results of the experiment show that animation was the best-performing method for achieving visual attention in a video game regardless of which colorblind perspective it was seen from, both in terms of time to first fixation and total fixation duration. Out of red, green, blue, and yellow which were the colors tested, yellow was the best-performing color in terms of average time to first fixations and total fixation duration across all colorblind perspectives. However, green was the most consistent color from all perspectives. Conclusions. The eye-tracking method used for gathering the data provided good results. Out of animation, color, and outline, animation was substantially better at achieving visual attention compared to the other two methods. A noticeable difference in attention can also be found depending on what chromatic perspective the scenes were viewed from. This thesis serves as a way to raise awareness about visual attention in video games, and examples of how the results can be utilized are provided. The experiment could be used as inspiration for future work within the field, where a larger sample size and more methods for achieving visual attention could be tested.

Clinicians are becoming increasingly aware of the effect of various pathologieso n the characteristicso f saccadice ye movements.A s such, an efficient and non-invasivem eano f measuringe ye-movementisn a clinical environmenti s of interest to many. The aim of this thesis is to investigate the clinical application of a non-invasive eye movement recording technique as a part of a clinical examination. Eye movements were measured using an IRIS 6500 infrared limbal eye tracker, which we customized for the direct recording of oblique eye movements as well as horizontal and vertical. Firstly, the eye-tracker itself was assessed. Visually normal observers made saccadic eye movements to a 10' stimulus in eight directions of gaze. Primary (ANOVA) and secondary analyses (mean error less than 5%) resulted in acceptance that averaging four measurements would give a representative measurement of saccadic latency, peak velocity, amplitude and duration. Test-retest results indicated that this technique gives statistically (± 1.96*STDEVDifference) repeatable responses. Severalf actors that could potentially influence clinically basedm easureso f eye-movementsw ere examined. These included, the effect of ageing, viewing distances, dioptric blur and cataract. The results showed that saccadic latency and durationa re significantly (p< 0.05) longer in older (60-89 years)o bserversc ompared to younger (20-39 years). Peak velocity and amplitude were not significantly affectedb y the age of the observer.A ll saccadicp arameters( SP) were significantly affected by direction (Chapter 5). The compact nature of this eye movement methodology is obtainable since there is no significant effect on viewing distance (300 cm vs. 49 cm) (Chapter 6). There is also no significant effect of dioptric blur (up to +LOODS) on any of the four SP. In contrast, a higher level of defocus (+3.O ODS)h as a larger probability of interfering with the measurementso f peak velocity and duration (Chapter 7). Saccadice ye-movementsw ere also recorded whilst normally sighted subjects wore cataract simulation goggles. The results suggested that the presence of dense cataract introduces significant increases in saccadic latencies and durations. No effect was found on the peak velocities and amplitudes.T he effect of amblyopiao n SP was also investigatedin order to examine if this methodologyi s able to detectn ormal from abnormalr esponses(i . e. increased saccadicla tencies).T his set of data (Chapter9 ) showedt hat using IRIS 6500, longer than normal latencies may be recorded from the amblyopic eye but no consistent effect was found for the other SP (peak velocity, amplitude, duration). overall, the results of this thesis demonstrateth at the IRIS 6500 eye-tracker has many desirable elements (it is non-invasive; comfortable for the observers and gives repeatable and precise results in an acceptable time) that would potentially make it a useful clinical tool as a part of a routine examination.

Smarta enheter blir allt vanligare och teknologierna de använder blir allt mer avancerade. Som en följd av detta uppstår bekväma och effektiva lösningar till vardagliga problem. En stor mängd sammankopplade smarta enheter leder dock till system som är svåra att förstå och att använda. Detta ställer krav på lösningar som hjälper användare att interagera med enheter på ett intuitivt och effektivt sätt. En teknik som under de senaste åren blivit allt mer kommersiellt brukbar och som kan användas i detta syfte är augmented reality. Vidare så är spårning av ögonpositioner ett lovande tillvägagångssätt för att navigera virtuella menyer.Denna uppsats har som syfte att utvärdera hur ögon- och huvudrörelser kan kombineras för att låta användare på ett intuitivt sätt interagera med ett gränssnitt i augmented reality. För att uppnå detta tas två interaktionsmetoder fram som använder ögon- och huvudrörelser på något olika sätt. För att utvärdera deras prestanda och användbarhet så utförs ett experiment där deltagarna navigerar en uppsättning menyer både med hjälp av de framtagna metoderna och en beprövad referensmetod.Resultaten från experimentet visar att referensmetoden både är den snabbaste och den minst felbenägna ut av de tre utvärderade metoderna. Trots detta så föredrar deltagarna en av de framtagna metoderna, och båda dessa metoder uppnår adekvata resultat. Vidare så visar den kvantitativa datan inte på några mätbara skillnader mellan de framtagna metoderna. Däremot så uppnår en av dem högre resultat i de subjektiva utvärderingarna. / Smart devices are becoming increasingly common and technologically advanced. As aresult, convenient and effective approaches to everyday problems are emerging. However,a large amount of interconnected devices result in systems that are difficult to understandand use. This necessitates solutions that help users interact with their devices in anintuitive and effective way. One such possible solution is augmented reality, which hasbecome a viable commercial technology in recent years. Furthermore, tracking the positionof users’ eyes to navigate virtual menus is a promising approach that allows for interestinginteraction techniques.In this thesis, we explore how eye and head movements can be combined in an effortto provide intuitive input to an augmented reality user interface. Two novel interactiontechniques that combine these modalities slightly differently are developed. To evaluatetheir performance and usability, an experiment is conducted in which the participantsnavigate a set of menus using both our proposed techniques and a baseline technique.The results of the experiment show that out of the three evaluated techniques, thebaseline is both the fastest and the least error-prone. However, participants prefer oneof the proposed techniques over the baseline, and both of these techniques perform adequately.Furthermore, the quantitative data shows no measurable differences betweenthe proposed techniques, although one of them receives a higher score in the subjectiveevaluations.

Questo studio è composto da due ricerche. La prima riguarda bambini della scuola dell’infanzia di età compresa tra 4 e 6 anni (N=44) ed esplora la comprensione dell’ironia e la sua possibile correlazione tra la comprensione di norme sociali, la teoria della mente e la competenza emotiva. I risultati mostrano come la comprensione delle norme sociali, della loro violazione e le competenze emotive possono aiutare i bambini nella comprensione dell’ironia La seconda ricerca relativa agli adulti (N=88) esplora la correlazione tra teoria della mente ed elaborazione di informazioni ironiche attraverso l’utilizzo dello strumento eye tracker. Lo studio evidenzia relazioni significative tra lo sviluppo della teoria della mente di tipo emotivo e l’elaborazione di informazioni ironiche: nello specifico, si verifica che in presenza di un enunciato ironico, soggetti con una teoria della mente elevata osservano frasi/ disegni che descrivono la realtà dei fatti, mentre soggetti con una teoria della mente meno elevata osservano frasi/ disegni relativi al significato letterale dell’ironia. Ciò sembra confermare il ruolo della teoria della mente nell’elaborare forme di comunicazione non letterali già ad un livello di base, pre-riflessivo come quello qui indagato. / This research consists of two studies. The first, involving school children aged between 4 and 6 years (N = 44), explores the understanding of irony and its possible correlation between social norms understanding, theory of mind and emotional competence. The results show that the understanding of social norms, their violation and emotional skills can help children in irony understanding. The second study related to adults (N = 88), explores the relationship between theory of mind and irony visual elaboration with the eye tracker Instrument. Results found relationships between the development of emotional theory of mind and irony visual elaboration, confirming the role of theory of mind during the growth of the individual to elaborate ironic sentences.

近年來隨著電腦科技的進步，發展出了各種人機介面的應用。不同於傳統的滑鼠與鍵盤，新的人機介面往往在其他不同的領域能夠得到更好的發揮，眼動（eye movement）即是一個例子，利用眼球移動在螢幕上的眼動軌跡來操控電腦。另一方面，螢幕所呈現的內容也會影響使用者的眼動行為，例如閱讀文章時不同的文章內容就會影響使用者在看文章時的眼動行為，因此我們就可以從眼動軌跡去推測出使用者對於螢幕的內容（如文章或圖片）的反應。本論文的目的就是要找出閱讀文章時的眼動軌跡和閱讀者對該文章的理解程度之間的關連性，最後發展出一個系統，利用閱讀文章時的眼動軌跡就能去推測閱讀者對於文章的理解程度，而無需後續的閱讀測驗。 / 一般人通常對自身的眼動軌跡的進行方式不甚了解，認為閱讀文章的眼動應該是順著字句的進行而移動。其實仔細觀察細小的眼動軌跡會發現比想像中複雜的多，例如當我們閱讀到文意較為困難的片段時，通常都會放慢速度，或是反覆閱讀，又例如看到自己有興趣的主題時會凝視在某些區塊較久的時間等等行為，這些都是在各種不同的情境之下做出相對的反應。本論文提出了資料探勘的方法來分析複雜的眼動軌跡，能針對每個人不同的閱讀模式找出不同的眼動規則。此方法能適應各種使用者的閱讀習性，對閱讀理解程度的預測能達到更精確的效果。 / With the advance of the computer technology, there are many kinds of HCI (Human Computer interface) applications been developed in recent years. Different from mouse and keyboard, new interface will bring more benefits in different area, and eye-movement is an example. It extracts the trace of eye movement to control the computer. Furthermore, the screen content will also affect the eye-movement. For example, when the user reads the articles, the content will affect the eye-movement, so we can speculate the reaction of the user after seen the screen content (such as article or picture) by eye-movement. The goal of the paper is to find out the relationship between eye-movement and the degree of comprehension, and develop a system which can automatically measure reading comprehension without any follow-up comprehension test. / Most people don’t realize how there eye move. They think eye movements should be carried out along the words. In fact, eye movement will find more complex than imagined, for example, when we read the context of the article is more difficult, we often slow down or read over and over again. In another example, people will gaze at some of the subjects that they are interest in for a longer period of time. These reactions correspond to a variety of different situations. This paper presents a data mining approach to analyze complex eye movement. It can find out the different rules of eye movement for users who have different reading strategy. This method will be able to adapt to a variety of users reading habits, and make more accurate prediction with the degree of the comprehension.

The introduction of input devices with natural user interfaces in gaming hardware has changed the way we interact with games. Hardware with motion-sensing and gesture recognizing capabilities remove the constraint of interacting with games through typical traditional devices like mouse-keyboard and gamepads. This changes the way we approach games and how the game communicates back to us as the player opening new levels of interactivity. This thesis covers how eye tracker technology can be used to affect rendering effects in games.

Clinicians are becoming increasingly aware of the effect of various pathologies on the characteristics of saccadic eye movements. As such, an efficient and non-invasive means of measuring eye-movement in a clinical environment is of interest to many. The aim of this thesis is to investigate the clinical application of a non-invasive eye movement recording technique as a part of a clinical examination. Eye movements were measured using an IRIS 6500 infrared limbal eye tracker, which we customized for the direct recording of oblique eye movements as well as horizontal and vertical. Firstly, the eye-tracker itself was assessed. Visually normal observers made saccadic eye movements to a 10' stimulus in eight directions of gaze. Primary (ANOVA) and secondary analyses (mean error less than 5%) resulted in acceptance that averaging four measurements would give a representative measurement of saccadic latency, peak velocity, amplitude and duration. Test-retest results indicated that this technique gives statistically (± 1.96*STDEVDifference) repeatable responses. Several factors that could potentially influence clinically based measures of eye-movements were examined. These included, the effect of ageing, viewing distances, dioptric blur and cataract. The results showed that saccadic latency and duration are significantly (p < 0.05) longer in older (60-89 years) observers compared to younger (20-39 years). Peak velocity and amplitude were not significantly affected by the age of the observer. All saccadic parameters (SP) were significantly affected by direction (Chapter 5). The compact nature of this eye movement methodology is obtainable since there is no significant effect on viewing distance (300 cm vs. 49 cm) (Chapter 6). There is also no significant effect of dioptric blur (up to +LOODS) on any of the four SP. In contrast, a higher level of defocus (+3.O ODS) has a larger probability of interfering with the measurements of peak velocity and duration (Chapter 7). Saccadic eye-movements were also recorded whilst normally sighted subjects wore cataract simulation goggles. The results suggested that the presence of dense cataract introduces significant increases in saccadic latencies and durations. No effect was found on the peak velocities and amplitudes. The effect of amblyopia on SP was also investigated in order to examine if this methodology is able to detect normal from abnormal responses (i.e. increased saccadic latencies). This set of data (Chapter9 ) showed that using IRIS 6500, longer than normal latencies may be recorded from the amblyopic eye but no consistent effect was found for the other SP (peak velocity, amplitude, duration). Overall, the results of this thesis demonstrate that the IRIS 6500 eye-tracker has many desirable elements (it is non-invasive; comfortable for the observers and gives repeatable and precise results in an acceptable time) that would potentially make it a useful clinical tool as a part of a routine examination.

Avec ce travail, nous avons voulu mettre l'accent sur la validité externe des expérimentations et nous focaliser sur des situations dynamiques naturelles. Or dans ce type de situation, les traitements top-down, découlant des connaissances préalables et de l'objectif, guident préférentiellement l'allocation de l'attention, tandis que les traitements bottom-up (caractéristiques des entrées perceptives) ont une influence mineure. Ce travail est donc centré sur l'attention top-down. La situation choisie est une approche de carrefour en conduite automobile, les sous-tâches étudiées sont le contrôle du véhicule (la trajectoire) et la décision de s'arrêter ou non au carrefour. Deux objectifs opérationnels sont investigués à travers l'analyse des mouvements oculaires : 1/ distinguer les sous-tâches de contrôle du véhicule et de prise de décision, 2/ distinguer les processus de la sous-tâche de prise de décision. Pour chaque objectif, une approche qualitative puis quantitative sont explorées. Des techniques de classification supervisées ont notamment été utilisées pour distinguer les différents processus. Deux études ont été conduites afin de répondre à ces objectifs, une en simulateur de conduite et une en situation réelle de conduite, mettant toutes deux en scène des approches de carrefours. / In this work, we focus on the external validity of experiments and on natural dynamic situations. In this type of situation, the top-down treatments resulting from prior knowledge and goal preferably guide the allocation of attention, while the bottom-up treatments (characteristics of perceptual input) play a minor role. This work is then focused on top-down attention. The chosen situation is an approach of driving crossroads, the studied subtasks are the control of vehicle (trajectory) and the decision to stop or not at the crossroads. Two operational objectives are investigated by analyzing eye movements: 1/ discriminating the vehicle's control and decision making subtasks, 2/ discriminating the process of the decision making subtask. For each objective, we explore a qualitative and quantitative approach. In particular, supervised techniques of classification have been used to distinguish the different processes. Two studies were conducted in order to meet these objectives, one with a driving simulator and one in a real situation of driving, both involving approaches to crossroads.

閱讀是吸收知識的途徑，不同的閱讀模式所帶來的閱讀成效也會不同。如何透過機器學習的方式，從凝視點找出閱讀行為的關聯性，將是本研究的目標。實驗選擇低成本眼動儀紀錄讀者閱讀過程中的眼動資料，採用dispersion-based演算法找出凝視點，以計算凝視點特徵，包含凝視時間、凝視距離、凝視位置以及凝視方向。 本研究將閱讀模式分成五種類別，包含快讀、慢讀、精讀、跳讀與關鍵字識別，透過不同文章的呈現，引導30位測試者遵循其內容進行閱讀，藉此收集不同行為模式的眼動資料。實驗流程中所有的眼動資料會隨機被分成為兩份，依序建立不同維度的訓練資料，由交叉驗證的分類結果找出理想之特徵與維度。以每次挑選6位測試者的眼動數據為測試資料進行5次分類驗證，其平均正確率為78.24%、74.19%、93.75%、87.96%以及96.20%，均達到不錯的分類結果。 / Reading is one of the paths to acquire knowledge. The efficiency is different when different reading patterns are involved. It is the objective of this research to classify reading patterns from fixation data using machine learning techniques. In our experiment, a low-cost eye tracker is employed to record the eye movements during the reading process. A dispersion-based algorithm is implemented to identify fixation from the recorded data. Features pertaining to fixation including duration, path length, landing position and fixation direction are extracted for classification purposes. Five categories of reading pattern are defined and investigated in this study, namely, speed reading, slow reading, in-depth reading, skim-and-skip, and keyword spotting. We have recruited thirty subjects to participate in our experiment. The participants are instructed to read different articles using specific styles designated by the experimenter in order to assign label to the collected data. Feature selection is achieved by analyzing the predictive results of cross-validation from the training data obtained from all subjects. The average classification accuracies in five-fold cross-validation are 78.24%, 74.19%, 93.75%, 87.96% and 96.20% using the eye movements of the six randomly selected subjects as test data.

An open question in autism research is how to assess language abilities in this population. We investigated language development in monolingual and bilingual children with varying degrees of autism, ages 3 to 9, with the aim of better understanding vocabulary comprehension. Two different methodologies were used: the Receptive One-Word Picture Vocabulary Test (ROWPVT) and eye-tracker technique. We examined whether the eye-tracker could help in the assessment of these children because it does not require the child to point during the test. Four typically developing control children, 14 monolingual English children with moderate/mild autism, and 4 children (2 monolingual English, 2 bilingual Spanish/English) with severe autism were tested and the results of the ROWPVT test were compared to the eye-tracker results. Interestingly, bilingual children with severe autism had better results using eye-tracker than the traditional ROWPVT test. These results suggest that these children know more vocabulary than traditional test measures indicate.