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When Eyes Wander Around: Mind-Wandering as Revealed by Eye Movement Analysis with Hidden Markov Models

Mind-wandering has been shown to largely influence our learning efficiency, especially in the digital and distracting era nowadays. Detecting mind-wandering thus becomes imperative in educational scenarios. Here, we used a wearable eye-tracker to record eye movements during the sustained attention t...

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Autores principales: Lee, Hsing-Hao, Chen, Zih-Ling, Yeh, Su-Ling, Hsiao, Janet Huiwen, Wu, An-Yeu (Andy)
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8622810/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34833644
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s21227569
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author Lee, Hsing-Hao
Chen, Zih-Ling
Yeh, Su-Ling
Hsiao, Janet Huiwen
Wu, An-Yeu (Andy)
author_facet Lee, Hsing-Hao
Chen, Zih-Ling
Yeh, Su-Ling
Hsiao, Janet Huiwen
Wu, An-Yeu (Andy)
author_sort Lee, Hsing-Hao
collection PubMed
description Mind-wandering has been shown to largely influence our learning efficiency, especially in the digital and distracting era nowadays. Detecting mind-wandering thus becomes imperative in educational scenarios. Here, we used a wearable eye-tracker to record eye movements during the sustained attention to response task. Eye movement analysis with hidden Markov models (EMHMM), which takes both spatial and temporal eye-movement information into account, was used to examine if participants’ eye movement patterns can differentiate between the states of focused attention and mind-wandering. Two representative eye movement patterns were discovered through clustering using EMHMM: centralized and distributed patterns. Results showed that participants with the centralized pattern had better performance on detecting targets and rated themselves as more focused than those with the distributed pattern. This study indicates that distinct eye movement patterns are associated with different attentional states (focused attention vs. mind-wandering) and demonstrates a novel approach in using EMHMM to study attention. Moreover, this study provides a potential approach to capture the mind-wandering state in the classroom without interrupting the ongoing learning behavior.
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spelling pubmed-86228102021-11-27 When Eyes Wander Around: Mind-Wandering as Revealed by Eye Movement Analysis with Hidden Markov Models Lee, Hsing-Hao Chen, Zih-Ling Yeh, Su-Ling Hsiao, Janet Huiwen Wu, An-Yeu (Andy) Sensors (Basel) Article Mind-wandering has been shown to largely influence our learning efficiency, especially in the digital and distracting era nowadays. Detecting mind-wandering thus becomes imperative in educational scenarios. Here, we used a wearable eye-tracker to record eye movements during the sustained attention to response task. Eye movement analysis with hidden Markov models (EMHMM), which takes both spatial and temporal eye-movement information into account, was used to examine if participants’ eye movement patterns can differentiate between the states of focused attention and mind-wandering. Two representative eye movement patterns were discovered through clustering using EMHMM: centralized and distributed patterns. Results showed that participants with the centralized pattern had better performance on detecting targets and rated themselves as more focused than those with the distributed pattern. This study indicates that distinct eye movement patterns are associated with different attentional states (focused attention vs. mind-wandering) and demonstrates a novel approach in using EMHMM to study attention. Moreover, this study provides a potential approach to capture the mind-wandering state in the classroom without interrupting the ongoing learning behavior. MDPI 2021-11-14 /pmc/articles/PMC8622810/ /pubmed/34833644 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s21227569 Text en © 2021 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Lee, Hsing-Hao
Chen, Zih-Ling
Yeh, Su-Ling
Hsiao, Janet Huiwen
Wu, An-Yeu (Andy)
When Eyes Wander Around: Mind-Wandering as Revealed by Eye Movement Analysis with Hidden Markov Models
title When Eyes Wander Around: Mind-Wandering as Revealed by Eye Movement Analysis with Hidden Markov Models
title_full When Eyes Wander Around: Mind-Wandering as Revealed by Eye Movement Analysis with Hidden Markov Models
title_fullStr When Eyes Wander Around: Mind-Wandering as Revealed by Eye Movement Analysis with Hidden Markov Models
title_full_unstemmed When Eyes Wander Around: Mind-Wandering as Revealed by Eye Movement Analysis with Hidden Markov Models
title_short When Eyes Wander Around: Mind-Wandering as Revealed by Eye Movement Analysis with Hidden Markov Models
title_sort when eyes wander around: mind-wandering as revealed by eye movement analysis with hidden markov models
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8622810/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34833644
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s21227569
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