Eye tracking can be a fantastic method to gauge visual attention: humans tend to look where they attend, so tracking gaze is highly informative. Unfortunately, decent-quality data requires specialised equipment that can only be deployed in lab settings. Where other research has scaled through web-based data collection, its reliance on dedicated hardware prevents eye-tracking studies to do the same. One potential avenue has been webcam-based eye tracking, but this has proved prone to poor data quality and exceptionally high attrition (losing around 50% of a sample is not uncommon). Fortunately, there exists a more inclusive alternative: mouse-viewing. This technique blurs a stimulus screen outside of a cursor-locked aperture, in an attempt to mimic the high-resolution fovea and its blurry periphery. In this talk, I will highlight a variety of studies into this approach that show which aspects of visual attention can and cannot be captured. I will also quantify how the reliabilities of measures derived from mouse and gaze compare.
The talk be followed by drinks, nibbles and an opportunity for networking and conversation.
If attending online: Zoom webinar