On the Use of Gaze as a Measure for Performance in a Visual Exploration Task

Visual exploration skill acquisition is important for many vocational professions, yet many apprentices struggle to acquire these skills, impacting both their grades and practical work. Traditionally, the learning of visual skills is facilitated through exercises where it can be difficult to identify struggling apprentices early. We propose the use of gaze patterns to identify apprentices who may need additional support. In this paper, we investigated differences in gaze patterns between teachers and apprentices and the relationship between gaze patterns and student performance. In a study with 18 fashion design apprentices and 16 fashion design teacher, we found teachers have a higher gaze coverage of an image than apprentices and there is a correlation between the verbalisation score of apprentices and their similarity of gaze patterns to the teacher average. Using these results, we may be able to adapt exercises to apprentices’ particular needs early in the learning process.