Comparative analyses of the information content of letters, characters, and inter-word spaces across writing systems

doi:10.1111/nyas.15178

PSYCH OpenIR

	Comparative analyses of the information content of letters, characters, and inter-word spaces across writing systems
	Huang, Linjieqiong 1; Reichle, Erik D.2; Li, Xingshan 1,3
通讯作者	Li, Xingshan(lixs@psych.ac.cn)
摘要	One difference among writing systems is how orthographic cues are used to demarcate words; although most alphabetic scripts use inter-word spaces, some Asian scripts do not explicitly mark word boundaries (e.g., Chinese). It is unclear whether these differences are arbitrary or whether they are designed to maximize reading efficiency. Here, we show that spaces inserted between words in non-demarcated scripts provide less information about word boundaries than spaces in demarcated scripts. Furthermore, despite the fact that less information is contained by inter-word spaces than characters/letters of the same size, the information content of inter-word spaces in demarcated scripts is closer to that of characters/letters compared to the information content of inter-word spaces that are inserted in non-demarcated scripts. These results suggest that the conventions used to demarcate word boundaries are sufficient to support efficient reading. Our findings provide new insights into the universals and variation across writing systems and shed light on the mental processes that support skilled reading. The different methods for marking word boundaries that have been adopted by various writing systems are not arbitrary but are instead co-determined by other orthographic properties of the writing systems and have been adopted to increase reading efficiency. image
关键词	information theory reading scripts writing systems
	2024-07-02
语种	英语
DOI	10.1111/nyas.15178
发表期刊	ANNALS OF THE NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES
ISSN	0077-8923
页码	11
收录类别	SCI
资助项目	National Natural Science Foundation of China[32371156] ; Postdoctoral Research Foundation of China[2022M723362] ; Scientific Foundation of Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences[E2CX6625CX]
出版者	WILEY
WOS关键词	EYE-MOVEMENT CONTROL ; UNSPACED TEXT ; CHINESE TEXT ; SEGMENTATION ; PREDICTABILITY ; JAPANESE ; ENTROPY
WOS研究方向	Science & Technology - Other Topics
WOS类目	Multidisciplinary Sciences
WOS记录号	WOS:001260129500001
资助机构	National Natural Science Foundation of China ; Postdoctoral Research Foundation of China ; Scientific Foundation of Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
引用统计
文献类型	期刊论文
条目标识符	https://ir.psych.ac.cn/handle/311026/49280
通讯作者	Li, Xingshan
作者单位	1.Chinese Acad Sci, Inst Psychol, CAS Key Lab Behav Sci, Beijing, Peoples R China 2.Macquarie Univ, Sch Psychol Sci, Sydney, Australia 3.Univ Chinese Acad Sci, Dept Psychol, Beijing, Peoples R China
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714	Huang, Linjieqiong,Reichle, Erik D.,Li, Xingshan. Comparative analyses of the information content of letters, characters, and inter-word spaces across writing systems[J]. ANNALS OF THE NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES,2024:11.
APA	Huang, Linjieqiong,Reichle, Erik D.,&Li, Xingshan.(2024).Comparative analyses of the information content of letters, characters, and inter-word spaces across writing systems.ANNALS OF THE NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES,11.
MLA	Huang, Linjieqiong,et al."Comparative analyses of the information content of letters, characters, and inter-word spaces across writing systems".ANNALS OF THE NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES (2024):11.