Difference between revisions of "Eye Tracking"
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Revision as of 20:02, 10 February 2022
Contents
Eye Tracking
Eye tracking is an umbrella term for modern technology that computes eye movements into a data stream. This data provides insights on people's preferences, attention, and interactions. These data streams typically measure the point of gaze and/or the motion of an eye and are matched with behavioral and cognitive sciences to transform this data into usable research. Specifically, eye tracking can collect where a user looks, how long they look, and their overall eye path movement.
The internal processes that are able to capture eye tracking are called fixation and saccades. Fixation refers to pauses in eye movements and are typically very brief. These pauses are registered in our foveal vision and registers with clarity and detail in our brains. This is what eye trackers document as our brains attention is primarily in these fixations. Saccades refers to the rapid movement between fixations.
Eye tracking technologies have seen recent growth in marketing, advertisement, and other business intelligence improvements. However, these technologies have also been a point of reference for studies on information processing, patterns of decision making, and other topics spanning the cognitive science field.
History
The history of eye tracking dates back to 1879 when Louise Emile Javal, a French ophthalmologist, noticed patients did not read smoothly across pages. This marked one of the first documented scientific interests in eye movement technologies in the form of pauses and fluidity of eye movements during reading.
In 1908, Edmund Burke Huey, a contributor to the field of psychology, built a sense eye tracking device. This device consisted if a contact lens with a small hole in the pupil attached to a pointer. This pointer tracked eye movements by changing position with the movement of the eyes.
The first recordings of eye tracking were published in 1937 by psychologist Guy Thomas Buswell. The recording documented light beams on readers eyes and further documented the relationship between eye movements and reading. [1]
Introduction of eye tracking to modern technology
In the late 1990s, large advertising agencies implemented eye tracking technology to study users' reactions to internet content and to measure the potential of the (at the time) emerging internet market. The current research shift involving eye tracking technology has encompassed a focus on human computer interaction. This field of research has come into demand largely due to demand by marketing strategies for advertisement and big tech companies. This research aims to understand how our brain interacts with the media or web pages we view on our devices. Eye tracking technology has been used in a diagnostic role in this research to understand users' preferences, behaviors, and opinions. This research allows for companies' innovation of strategic user experience designs. Innovation in this field, specifically, has been significant due to its ability to inform the product design process for large companies. [2]
Current Market
The current market for eye tracking has been dominated by the possible introduction of biometric systems in defense organizations. The eye tracking market has very few corporate players, however, there are several systems that currently divide the corporate market: head-mounted vision trackers, optical trackers, and electrooculography systems. Head-mounted systems are typically used in healthcare and research due to its invasive nature, while the other two techniques can be used on a wider corporate scale. [3]
Current Techniques
With modern advancements in modern eye tracking technology, there are currently two main categories, comprised of three to four total techniques, that are utilized in eye movement measurements. The two major categories are measuring the position of the eye relative to the head and measuring the point of the eye relative to its space (typically used for user experience research). [4]
| Method | description |
|---|---|
| Electro-OculoGraphyl | This method measures the electric potential difference of the skin in relation to electrodes placed around the eyes. This method relies on eye position in relation to head position. |
| scleral contact lens/search coil | This is one of the most precise eye tracking methods. This is done through a contact lens with a mechanical or optical reference point. This contact lens typically goes over both the cornea and sclera. This method measures eye position in relation to the head. |
| Photo or Video-OculoGraphy | This method measures the eye under rotation/translation, shape of the pupil, position of the limbus, and corneal reflection. |
Ethical Concerns
One major concern of eye tracking technology are consumer privacy breaches. These consumer privacy breaches revolve around user consent in the case of videotaping/camera use in order to obtain the eye tracking data. There have been many efforts in the eye tracking field to de-identify consumer data, as well as create heat or noise maps for tracking rather than direct video footage. [5] However, in addition to big tech companies access to footage without acknowledged consent, eye tracking technology may also reveal private information about the consumers, such as race, gender, etc. Further, these companies typically create decision making models based off the consumers data which reveal intention, cognitive ability, opinion, etc. This has caused concern among the public which has caused a recent pressure on policy makers and corporations to reevaluate consumer privacy regulations. These same concerns are often seen in the implementation of facial recognition technology.
Surveillance
Both facial recognition and eye tracking technology have introduced the possibility of a new wave of surveillance technology. There is a concern that the modes in which these technologies allow for one group to track to movements (eye or general) of another group, that this will allow for mass surveillance and a change in authority dynamics due to the power of this tracking technology. Although currently the surveillance used by eye tracking technology has been utilized mainly by retailer and marketing firms use of the data, there is growing concern about the technologies expansion into policing and criminal justice world: threatening a possible surveillance state.[6]
Scientific Uses
Eye tracking technology grew in the 2000s uses expanded to implement eye tracking to aid scientific/ medical technologies. Eye tracking technology was created to aid disabled persons communication, identify early ways to identify/diagnose eye abnormalities, and explain cognitive growth throughout childhood. Further, it was used in the fields of computer science to test user experience/ usability of new websites and software.
One of the most prominent uses of eye tracking technology is in the user experience field. The modern use of eye tracking in user experience is by corneal reflection which enables researchers to track eye movements. Corneal reflection requires a light source to shine onto the cornea and a high resolution camera that documents the reflection. The first documented use of corneal reflection was in 1901 and later in the 1950s contact lenses were developed to aid this technique that relied on physical contact with the eyeball. Today, less invasive methods are used and detailed algorithms connect the reflection recordings to point of gaze and make meaning of the eye movements data streams.
Virtual Reality
Eye tracking technology has greatly expanded due to the introduction of virtual reality devices. Thus, the market for eye-tracking devices is predicted to expand to$1.75 billion by 2025, [3] Eye tracking technology is expected to be vital to virtual reality due to the expansion of interactive ability; however, the security and privacy capabilities of possibly implementing retinal scanning/identification systems have also swept the industry. [7] In terms of interaction benefits, eye tracking technology has the capacity to create higher quality graphics, enhanced character to character interactions, and increased adaptability to users. On the company side, they will be able to have better analytical data of users' interaction with the virtual realities, as well as a possible biometric database.
Google Glass
Although eye-tracking technology had been around for decades, it was introduced into mainstream dialogue with the launch of Google Glass in 2014. Google glass is a consumer smart-eyeware that tracks the users' eye movements (in addition to voice and motion) and displays. However, the technology has received mass attention due to security and privacy concerns, thus marking one of the first wide debates on the ethical concerns of eye-tracking technology. It was discovered soon after launch that Google Glass was widely susceptible to cyber attacks, thus threatening users' financial information, passwords, personal identification, and any other data the eyewear collected. Google has come out with statements with adjustments to security concerns (ie. they will not be allowing facial recognition technology on the device), but there have not been significant changes. [8]
References
- ↑ W., Leggett, D., & Officer, C. (n.d.). A brief history of eye-tracking: Ux booth. Retrieved February 10, 2022, from https://www.uxbooth.com/articles/a-brief-history-of-eye-tracking/
- ↑ Sareen, S. S. (2014). Analysis of eye tracking data obtained by customers' product evaluations (Order No. 1565246). Available from Dissertations & Theses @ CIC Institutions; ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (1616587578). Retrieved from https://proxy.lib.umich.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/dissertations-theses/analysis-eye-tracking-data-obtained-customers/docview/1616587578/se-2?accountid=14667
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Harwood, T., & Jones, M. (2013). Mobile eye-tracking in retail research. Current Trends in Eye Tracking Research, 183-199. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-02868-2_14
- ↑ Duchowski, Andrew. (2007). Eye Tracking Methodology Theory and Practice. London: Springer London : Imprint: Springer.
- ↑ Liu, Ao ; Xia, Lirong ; Duchowski, Andrew ; Bailey, Reynold ; Holmqvist, Kenneth ; Jain, Eakta. (n.d.). Differential privacy for eye-tracking data. Proceedings of the 11th ACM Symposium on eye tracking research & applications. ACM.
- ↑ Levy, K., & Barocas, S. (2018). Privacy at the Margins| Refractive Surveillance: Monitoring Customers to Manage Workers. International Journal Of Communication, 12, 23. Retrieved from https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/7041
- ↑ Rogers, S. (2019, February 05). Seven reasons why eye-tracking will fundamentally change VR. Retrieved February 10, 2022, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/solrogers/2019/02/05/seven-reasons-why-eye-tracking-will-fundamentally-change-vr/?sh=632c7ebd3459
- ↑ Safavi, Seyedmostafa & Shukur, Zarina. (2014). Improving Google glass security and privacy by changing the physical and software structure. Life Sciences. 11.
