Amount of gaze

[Xinfu]

Is it correc to use gaze? (I think it could be a noun, but am not sure whether it fits here)

-John and Mary had the identical amount of __.

[MWoll]

It doesn't work here. What are you trying to say?

[Xinfu]

Originally Posted by MWoll

It doesn't work here. What are you trying to say?

My sentence is describing a psychology experiment, during which the two persons have to gaze at a certain number of words. Is it correct to use gaze?:

-same amount of __.

To us non-native speakers, usually we find answers in dictionaries. If a dictionary says 'gaze' should be a singular countable noun, then it should at least be a gaze/the gaze/gazes, because gaze cannot stand alone (=countable). But the problem is, dictionaries cannot include everything and they do not have enough example sentences to tell us whether a usage is correct or not.

[wrholt]

"same amount of gaze" doesn't work because we can't identify what quality or characteristic of "gaze" you are trying to measure or compare.

Non-count nouns for tangible things such as "milk" or "flour" are things that we measure constantly by specific qualities that can be measured, such as "volume" or "weight". "Same/identical amount of milk/flour" works because we automatically assume that you are talking about either volume or weight, rather than about other qualities such as color or temperature.

But we don't think of a gaze (a single instance of gazing) as something one measures, and there is no specific quality of a gaze that we automatically think of when we see/hear the expression "same/different amount of gaze".

If you want to talk about a measurable quantity of of a particular quality that a gaze has, you must explicit state what quality you are measuring. Are you measuring intensity? Length? The number of items at which the gaze is directed? Something else?

[AngelicaDeAlquezar]

"To gaze" implies to stare at things for a long time; for the kind of experiment you seem to describe, you probably want to change the verb, depending on the actual activity of the subjects:

- the same amount of words to look at / to watch / to observe / to stare...
- ... words watched / observed / watched...

The gaze can be used as a noun to talk about a fixed look on something, not the object the eye looks at fixedly.

[Xinfu]

Originally Posted by wrholt

"same amount of gaze" doesn't work because we can't identify what quality or characteristic of "gaze" you are trying to measure or compare.

Non-count nouns for tangible things such as "milk" or "flour" are things that we measure constantly by specific qualities that can be measured, such as "volume" or "weight". "Same/identical amount of milk/flour" works because we automatically assume that you are talking about either volume or weight, rather than about other qualities such as color or temperature.

But we don't think of a gaze (a single instance of gazing) as something one measures, and there is no specific quality of a gaze that we automatically think of when we see/hear the expression "same/different amount of gaze".

If you want to talk about a measurable quantity of of a particular quality that a gaze has, you must explicit state what quality you are measuring. Are you measuring intensity? Length? The number of items at which the gaze is directed? Something else?

Um...I think the experiment talks about time, because time is the thing that is important in psychology. If gaze is wrong, what expression do you think we could use?

[wrholt]

Try "duration of gaze" or "length of gaze"; they have the same meaning in your original context.

[Xinfu]

Excellent answer. Thank you.