Abstract
Vision specialists, neurologists, and psychologists commonly rely on manual techniques to evaluate oculomotor system performance: (1) direct observation tests such as the NSUCO oculomotor test and (2) visual-verbal formats like Pierce, King-Devick, and DEM tests. Unfortunately, these tests mainly cover a rough and subjective evaluation of oculomotor performance and are limited by observer's experience or measurement obtaining. Our study aims to address these limitations by developing objective and quantitative approach to assess eye movement performance in children and adults using eye-tracking technology. We have developed a method for detailed eye movement analysis in clinical practice, which evaluates (1) saccades (reflexive, voluntary, and anti-saccades), (2) smooth pursuit eye movements (horizontal, vertical, and circular), (3) fixation stability, and (4) reading eye movement parameters, including saccades, regressions, number of fixations, fixation duration, and reading speed. Our method was tested on 378 children aged 6–13 years using Tobii Pro Fusion eye-tracker. By applying our newly developed quantitative methodology, we were able to identify the benefits and limitations of our approach. We believe our method will be particularly useful for vision specialists, and we aim to continue refining and improving it in future studies.
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Acknowledgements
We would like to express our gratitude to schools participating in the study (Marupe State Gymnasium, Marupe Elementary School, Riga Cultures Secondary School, and Kuldiga Center Secondary School), as well as speech therapists J.Hanzovska, L.Meiersone, M.Vorza, I.Petuhova, S.Depa, S.Jirgensone. The study is supported by the Latvian Council of Science (project No lzp-2021/1–0219, and SIA Mikrotikls and University of Latvia Foundation (project No 2260) and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.
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Krumina, G. et al. (2023). The Development of Objective and Quantitative Eye-Tracking-Based Method for the Diagnostics of Oculomotor Dysfunctions. In: Dekhtyar, Y., Saknite, I. (eds) 19th Nordic-Baltic Conference on Biomedical Engineering and Medical Physics. NBC 2023. IFMBE Proceedings, vol 89. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-37132-5_2
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