Investigating the visual exploration of the rural-urban gradient using eye-tracking

We analyze if the visual exploration of landscape photographs is influenced by the urbanization level of the landscape and whether this is correlated with visual landscape complexity. We determine if differences in viewing behavior are related to differences in complexity, expressed by the photograph's spectral entropy. An eye-tracking experiment is conducted to measure visual behavior while observing the photographs. A more extensive and dispersed exploration is found in more urbanized landscapes. The fixation pattern is more restricted and clustered in weakly urbanized landscapes. When buildings are lacking, this trend cannot be extrapolated since these landscapes seem to elicit an unexpectedly extensive exploration. The urbanization level is positively correlated with the visual complexity, indicating its potential influence on the viewing behavior.