A
Postdoc
Institute of Design and Visual Interaction
Kristian Nicolaisen
I study how our visual and cognitive systems work to make sense of written text, and how type design can support this. Using experimental methods, including eye-tracking, I test how typography, vision and language interact when legibility is pushed to the limit. In this, I examine individual differences in typeface processing, and how adapting type can help visually impaired readers navigate text.
Kristian Nicolaisen
When Words Meet the Eye and Mind
Designing Typography for the Individual Reader
Two people can read the exact same page in the exact same font and come away with completely different experiences. One finds it easy, the other struggles. My research asks what specifically differs between them, in how their eyes move and how their visual system processes the words and letters, and whether adjusting the typography accordingly can improve the reading experience.
As a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre for Visibility Design, I combine my background in language processing and visual cognition with expertise from psychologists, designers, human-centered AI researchers at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU), and clinicians at Aarhus University Hospital. Our aim is to understand variation in reading between people, with the goal of developing digital text presentation that adapts to the reader’s needs.
Towards adaptive typography
Fluent reading depends on more than where the eyes are pointed in any given instant. Several times a second the eyes jump forward, and a surprising amount of the work happens just before each jump lands, as the visual system picks up rough information about the next word while still looking at the current one.
Within the project VISTA (Visual Impairment Support Through AI), we collaborate with the DTU on a reading application that detects when a reader is struggling, for instance from their eye movements and posture, and adjusts the digital presentation of the type accordingly.
To inform this development, I test how manipulating typography changes what gets picked up at the edge of vision. For example, whether setting the letters further apart makes an upcoming word easier to recognise before it is looked at, and whether this helps more for words that are more or less expected in the context.
Reading is not only about where the eye lands. The visual system is always working ahead, extracting information from words not yet looked at.
Reading through a tunnel
In retinitis pigmentosa (RP), an inherited condition affecting the retina, the visual field gradually narrows, eventually leading to tunnel vision. Readers may still see the word they are looking at clearly, while the words around it fall outside their remaining field of view. This makes it harder to see what is coming next and to follow the text smoothly along the line.
As part of VISTA, I work together with clinicians at Aarhus University Hospital to collect eye-movement data from readers with RP. I’m testing whether typographic changes can make reading easier for this group by giving clearer input both at the centre of the remaining field and towards its edges, and if so, which types of words in a sentence benefit most. Running the same experiments with normally sighted readers lets me compare whether these changes work differently when the field is constricted than when it is intact.