Perception最新文献

Studies have shown that the transposed-letter effect is moderated by visual factors, but whether the transposed-character effect in the Chinese language is moderated by visual factors such as contrast display remains unknown. Accordingly, we conducted two experiments using a single-presentation lexical decision task with real words (), transposed-character () and replacement-character () pseudowords that manipulated the visual features of the stimuli, with four characters in the same color or the first two characters and the last two characters in different colors ( vs ) in Experiment 1 and critical characters in plain or highlighted text ( vs ) in Experiment 2, to explore whether contrast display moderates the transposed-character effect. The results revealed that color segmentation and critical character highlighting did not significantly moderate the transposed-character effect. The stability of the transposed-character effect suggests that this effect may be influenced mainly by language factors. This is important for achieving a comprehensive understanding of the transposed-character effect and the core mechanism of the Chinese reading process.

Faces are important communicative signals in humans and face perception is believed to involve specialised mechanisms in the visual system. Several other categories of stimuli are also thought to involve specialised processes, including bodies, letters, places, and food. A recently described face size illusion shows that upright faces appear physically smaller than identical inverted faces. This illusion appears to be highly face-specific, not occurring for other stimulus categories, such as bodies, letters, and hands. In this study, we investigated whether an analogous size inversion illusion occurs for items of food, a category which has recently been found to also involve specialised processes in the visual system. The results provided a clear replication of the face size illusion, with upright faces seen as smaller than inverted faces. In contrast, items of food and everyday objects showed an effect in the opposite direction, appearing larger when upright than when inverted. These results provide further evidence for the highly face-selective nature of the face size illusion. They also provide evidence for a different size illusion which affects visual perception of food.

Perceptual learning is a process of developing the skill to differentiate previously undifferentiated information. In this study participants learned to identify novel objects (feelies). To test the role of visual exploration, objects were viewed from either a side or a top view and displayed as either static pictures or rotating about a vertical axis, with moving objects facilitating more visual exploration. In Experiment 1, a simple object discrimination task was used. Participants reached perfect accuracy sooner in static conditions than in motion conditions, regardless of viewpoint, suggesting that although movement may have promoted greater exploratory activity, the information provided by movement did not influence object shape discrimination. Experiment 2 investigated if a functionally relevant task would necessitate the use of greater exploratory activity for perceptual learning. Participants were required to either (1) think of potential uses for the feelies, (2) think of a predetermined use, or (3) describe the object's physical appearance. Visual exploration of objects benefited learning most in the condition in which observers generated potential uses for objects themselves. The affordance prime promoted functionally relevant learning. The most efficient pattern of learning was observed when participants generated uses for moving objects viewed from the side. These findings suggest that exploratory activity facilitates perceptual learning of affordances.

The scintillating grid illusion induces the phenomena of disappearance and scintillation. However, it is unclear in which peripheral region these phenomena occur. This study aimed to investigate the spatial properties of disappearance and scintillation phenomena in the scintillating grid illusion. In Experiment 1, participants binocularly observed a single-unit scintillating grid illusion and responded whether a white disk and illusory blackness were perceived. As a result, the perceptual region of the white disk was larger in the horizontal direction than in the vertical direction, as well as the perceptual region of the illusory blackness. This result indicates that both perceptual regions have spatial anisotropy. In Experiment 2, the same task as in Experiment 1 was performed with monocular viewing. The results did not exactly reject spatial anisotropy in monocular vision, regardless of the perceptual regions. This study may contribute to understanding how disappearance and scintillation phenomena coexist in the scintillating grid illusion.

Previous research has indicated that exposure to sensory stimuli of short or long durations influences the perceived duration of subsequent stimuli within the same modality. However, it remains unclear whether this adaptation is driven by the stimulus physical duration or by the perceived duration. We hypothesized that the absence of cross-modal duration adaptation observed in earlier studies was due to the mismatched perceived durations of adapting stimuli. To address this issue, we conducted two experiments to explore cross-modal adaptation and its dependence on perceived duration versus physical duration. Our findings reveal that the duration aftereffect from adapting to a visual stimulus aligns more closely with the perceptually matched stimulus duration rather than the physical duration. Moreover, adapting to a subjectively matched visual stimulus produced a significant aftereffect when the test stimulus was auditory, indicating the existence of the cross-modal adaptation. Thus, duration adaptation relies on perceived duration and can occur across sensory modalities. These results suggest a distinct neural representation of perceived duration, likely located at a convergence point for multisensory information, contributes to a unified temporal experience across different sensory channels.

This study investigated the performance of various spectrophotometric methods in predicting visually perceived translucency and evaluated the efficiency of imaging techniques in quantifying translucency. We conducted the visual assessment in two stages using the pair comparison method. In the first stage, pairs of samples with identical colors but differing levels of translucency were compared. In the second stage, we compared pairs of samples with different colors but almost identical translucency. In the first stage, spectrophotometric methods exhibited high Pearson correlation coefficients, ranging from 0.96 to 0.99, with visual perceptions, demonstrating their accuracy in estimating translucency. Examination samples of different colors also revealed that among spectrophotometric methods, L*, absorption, and contrast ratio, with Pearson correlation coefficients of approximately 0.96, 0.96, and 0.98, respectively, had the strongest correlations with perceptual data. Using imaging techniques, the best result was obtained by comparing the lightness of the sample image on a black background to the same value on a white background, yielding a Pearson correlation coefficient of approximately 0.87. Additionally, we employed imaging-based methods for predicting translucency in real 3-D objects with simple shapes and limited colors. Despite the limitations, these methods produced promising results.

Electrotactile stimulation is a çmethod of activating the tactile system by bypassing cutaneous mechanoreceptors and exciting the cutaneous afferent endings directly. This method is of interest for its potential in wearable tactile augmentation technologies. The generation of meaningful electrotactile sensation could benefit cases of peripheral neuropathy or prosthesis. There are limitations in our understanding of an electrotactile stimulations' capacity to represent tactile sensibilities, and its susceptibility to missense. The spatiotemporal parameters of an electrotactile sequence were varied. The present work extends the assessment of subjective evaluations of localization, velocity, and descriptive qualities. We applied electrotactile pulses at three sites on the foot sole, using three patterns across these sites: toward the heel or toes. We tested at three interstimulus intervals (100 ms, 160 ms, 220 ms). Faster sequences produced higher velocity ratings. Sequence direction across the foot sole impacted velocity ratings-with heel-to-toe sequences demonstrating a higher velocity rating than toe-to-heel sequences. During faster sequences with site repetition, cutaneous saltation is likely causing missense during localization. The spatiotemporal missense did not impact velocity ratings. This indicates that certain aspects of electrotactile sequence perception, such as velocity, are preserved through tactile illusions. These findings may be used to increase the resolution of stimulating grids.

This study investigates the impact of sectorial hemifield occlusions on the perception of the rotating snake illusion, a well-studied optical phenomenon. The rotating snake illusion induces the perception of movement in a static image and has been linked to cortical activation in areas such as hMT+ and MT. Binasal sectorial hemifield occlusions (BNO), which partially obscure the retina, have been explored in relation to mild traumatic brain injury and associated with increased visual evoked potentials. However, the mechanisms by which these occlusions modulate the perception of this illusion remain unclear. This study compared the effects of BNO and bitemporal occlusion (BTO) on the rotating snake illusion. Neurotypical participants rated the illusion's movement on a scale while being exposed to different occlusions. The results revealed that both BNO and BTO affect the perception of movement in the rotating snake illusion relative to baseline, but there was no evidence for a difference between these effects.

Illusions of self-motion (vection) can be improved by adding global visual oscillation to patterns of optic flow. Here we examined whether adding apparent visual oscillation (based on four-stroke apparent motion-4SAM) also improves vection. This apparent vertical oscillation was added to self-motion displays simulating constant velocity leftward self-motion. Our psychophysical experiment found that adding 4SAM oscillation to this optic flow significantly shortened the onset latency, and increased the rated strength, of our participants' vection. Interestingly, we found that the vection onset latencies in this 4SAM oscillation condition were similar to those produced when "real" oscillation was instead added to the optic flow-even though adding "real" oscillation (based on the global and continuous displacement of dots over time) generally resulted in stronger vection experiences. These results show vection can be enhanced by both "real" and apparent 4SAM visual stimuli indicating self-acceleration. They also confirm that global visual displacements are not required to generate these oscillation-based advantages for vection.

Exposure to microgravity induces abnormal experiences that may affect the perception of time. Head-down tilts (HDTs) are commonly used to investigate the effects of weightlessness. A -30° HDT is considered an appropriate model to simulate the acute phase of microgravity exposure. Temporal performance in a time reproduction task was assessed before and after 30 min of -30° HDT, using 800, 1,000, and 2,000 ms as standard intervals. Absolute error (AE), relative error (ratio), and coefficient of variation (CV) were calculated to quantify performance. Compared to baseline measures obtained prior to HDT, both the mean AE and the ratio were significantly increased after 30 min of -30° HDT at the 800 ms interval. A similar trend was observed at the 1,000 ms interval, but no significant effect was found at the 2,000 ms interval. No significant differences were observed in the CV before and after -30° HDT. Acute exposure to microgravity, simulated by the -30° HDT condition, primarily affects duration perception at sub-second intervals.