Absurd thing number 2: One of the reviewers, who I frankly suspect wrote their initial review using AI, insisted that our paper (a narrative review) required a method section. I'm all for rigour in reviews, but I've never read a review paper with a method section!

Absurd thing number 1: We had SIX reviews (and at least two rounds of revisions) and the editor still didn't make a clear decision.

I'm going to try and talk about 3 experiments, with 3 different eyetrackers, in 10 minutes. So we'll see how that goes!

Oh yes, we're in a similar "funny" situation:

Reviewer: minor revision, you must add more justification for X
Us: now added
Reviewer: changes are "ad hoc" and "reactive adjustments". Major revisions!

If changes in response to reviewer are criticised as "ad hoc" it kind of defeats the object...

We know plenty about covert attention in lab settings, but not much about how people spontaneously use it in social situations. It is hidden, but critical. It's like the dark matter of real world cognition and behaviour. 4/4

BUT, it is actually in real situations (complex, social, active) where that assumption is most likely to be false. We use covert attention (attending without moving the eyes) so that we can avoid signalling to other people. 3/4

People working with eyetrackers (including me) often assume that where someone is looking is what they are attending to (what is called the "eye-mind assumption"). This is particularly true if you try to do "real-world" research... 2/4

This is a great opportunity to work in an applied setting with med-tech and partners in Oxford and Stanford. And there will be fun remote eye tracking experiments too!