We tracked participants’ eye movements while they read brief expository texts with the location/presence of a causal connective (e.g., because) manipulated along with clause order (e.g., cause-effect versus effect-cause). The results suggested: (a) When a connective started the sentence, readers initially delayed processing, resulting in faster reading times in the first clause and greater regressions out of the second clause. (b) Processing causes was easier if a connective preceded them. (c) Adaptive changes based on clause order were restricted to sentences containing connectives. We conclude that connectives promote strategic reading and constrain processing to integrating the stated relationship between clauses.
Please check out our video walk through of the poster! If you are interested in discussing our poster, I will be available on Zoom (https://pitt.zoom.us/j/829487889) or Google Hangouts (https://hangouts.google.com/group/Mx8hefd36duELsvH9). My email for correspondence is kan106@pitt.edu.