Correlating the degree of observers preoccupation and the observation time: visual tasks with OBER2 eyetracker

This paper describes a set of visual tasks performed with a goal to find a correlation between observer's preoccupation and the observation time. Several aspects of objects differentiation were investigated: shape complexity, colour, uniqueness and size. Four visual tasks were performed by 10 volunteers. The eyeball position was captured with use of the OBER 2 eyetracker based on the infrared beam reflection measurements. Finally the recorded eyeball traces were subject of statistical processing. Interesting findings are the high attractiveness of complicated shapes and no influence of object's size on the observation time. Another result is an unexpected high inter-observers variation of attention difference in each visual task. The results play a key role in our research on perceptual model of biomedical signals and images. The other applications may be found in the area of visual information usability, ergonomics or perception-like control of automated visual systems.