Ask the Eyetrackers: Eyes Movement vs. Mouse Movement

Q: Do people tend to follow the path of their mouse with their eyes? Is there any correlation between the the user-controlled movement of the cursor and where the eyes track?

George Knue, editor, ChicagoSports.com

A: Every once in a blue moon, we see a person who tracks where he is looking with his mouse. It is very rare, and it is usually in periods of intense focus when he is trying to read something and is having trouble keeping his place. It is a little like how people use their finger to read in a book. It is rare, and when it happens, sporadic.

In general, unless someone has been explicitly instructed to use his mouse to follow where he is looking, it is safe to assume that there is no one-to-one correlation. The eyes move at speeds many magnitudes greater than any person can physically move his limbs. To try to force someone to tie his mouse to his gaze position will either 1) radically change how the person views a page, or 2) understate what the person glanced to, or both.

That said, I also don't want to suggest that there is no correlation. It is not uncommon to see people, as they are closing in on a click, bring their mouse in to the region where they happen to be looking as they prepare to make a choice. I have also anecdotally seen people hold their mouse over a link as they examine other options before finally clicking.

This would be an interesting topic to explore deeper, but it would require a controlled experiment to definitively say how much correlation there actually is, and under what circumstances.

Colin Johnson, CEO, Eyetools Inc.

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