The role of eye gaze in handwriting -Temporal changes of the positional relationship between a fixation point and a pen tip-

Abstract

We investigated the eye-hand interaction, focusing on the temporal changes of the positional relationship between a fixation point and a pen tip, in order to clarify the role of visual information in handwriting. In this experiment, par-ticipants were asked to draw the simple circle under the three different conditions; drawing by the out-of-ink ballpoint pen, close pursuit the printed model circle by the pen and drawing by normal ballpoint pen. The time series data on fixation and pen tip's coordinates were evaluated by DFT analysis of each data and the temporal development of the distance between fixation point and a pen tip. The result showed that there was a significant difference between pen tip's and fixation's temporal changes. Moreover, the new mode of eye-hand behavior was observed, called "Over-looking" mode. This result suggests that eye-hand interaction in handwriting must be discussed from at least the view point of the three modes of the behavior, for the development of engineering application for the handwrite training.