Fact · Typing and writing speed
Clifton and colleagues' review of Keith Rayner's 40 years of eye-movement research says that when children read, they make more and longer fixations than adults do.
Checked against its source on October 16, 2026
In the source's own words
“when children read, they make more and longer fixations than adults do”
Eye movements in reading and information processing: Keith Rayner's 40 year legacy, Charles Clifton Jr. et al., Journal of Memory and Language, 2016, Section on children's reading (Rayner, 1986).
Open the original (DOI 10.1016/j.jml.2015.07.004)- What it measures
- Rayner's 1986 study is the early eye-movement work on children's reading that the review draws on.
- What it does not show
- The review describes a general pattern. It does not give a words-per-minute figure for any grade.