Processing of computer-mediated feedback: An eye-tracking study

The current study explored the extent to which the linguistic focus of interactional feedback influences levels of L2 learners' attention to target features when feedback is supplied in the form of recasts during written synchronous computer-mediated communication (SCMC). The participants, 28 university students who were L1 Mandarin – L2 users of English (IELTS 6.5), were asked to provide information about the plot of a silent Charlie Chaplin film in the chat in Zoom. Interrogative, incidental recasts were provided by the researcher targeting lexical, morphological and syntactic features. In order to capture participants' attentional processes while reading the feedback, we used eye-tracking methodology and we employed Weblink software to generate measures showing number and length of fixations, duration of first fixation, and number of times learners returned to a target feature (interest area). For triangulation, we also conducted stimulated recall interviews so as to gain information about learners’ levels of noticing of target language areas. Both eye-tracking and stimulated recall interviews demonstrated greater levels of attention to lexical recasts than morphological and syntactic ones. In particular, lexical recasts led to more and longer fixations, and more returns to target features. The stimulated recall comments support this finding. Learners noticed target areas when lexical recasts were provided; whereas they perceived the majority of morphological and syntactic recasts as clarification requests or confirmation checks.