The effects of semantic consistency on eye movements during complex scene viewing

Eye movements were recorded while participants viewed line-drawing pictures of natural scenes in preparation for a memory test (Experiment 1) or to fi nd a target object (Experiment 2). initial saccades in a scene were not con trolled by semantic information in the visual periphery, although fixation densities and fixation durations were affected by semantic consistency. The results are compared with earlier eye-tracking studies, and a qualitative model of eye movement control in scene perception is discussed in which ini tial saccades in a scene are controlled by visual but not semantic analysis .