EasyEyes: Crowded dynamic fixation for online psychophysics

Online vision testing enables efficient data collection from diverse participants, but often requires accurate fixation. When needed, fixation accuracy is traditionally ensured by using a camera to track gaze. That works well in the laboratory, but tracking during online testing with a built-in webcam is not yet sufficiently precise. Kurzawski, Pombo, et al. (2023) introduced a fixation task that improves fixation through hand-eye coordination, requiring participants to track a moving crosshair with a mouse-controlled cursor. This dynamic fixation task greatly reduces peeking at peripheral targets relative to a stationary fixation task, but does not eliminate it. Here, we introduce a crowded dynamic fixation task that further enhances fixation by adding clutter around the fixation mark. We assessed fixation accuracy during peripheral threshold measurement. Relative to the root mean square gaze error during the stationary fixation task, the dynamic fixation error was 55%, whereas the crowded dynamic fixation error was only 40%. With a 1.5° tolerance, peeking occurred on 7% of trials with stationary fixation, 1.5% with dynamic fixation, and 0% with crowded dynamic fixation. This improvement eliminated implausibly low peripheral thresholds, likely by preventing peeking. We conclude that crowded dynamic fixation provides accurate gaze control for online testing.