Periocular features as a window on cognitive processing: from memory to understanding the semantic complexity of an image

Although it is well understood that changes in periocular features are linked to our brain activity, there is a paucity of research to analyze them in order to classify various cognitive processes. The present study investigates the effects on the periocular region of visual stimuli eliciting two different mental tasks: visual memory recall and understanding the semantic complexity of an image. The aim is to understand whether a subject is looking at an image with clear semantic content or not, or when he already knows the image that is shown to him. Based on these observations, the paper presents a study with the aim of demonstrating that the information that can be extracted from blinks, pupils and, gaze movements can potentially be used to classify people with respect to these two cognitive processes. Because there is a dearth of specialised research in this field, the encouraging results achieved in this study imply the necessity to generate specific datasets for this purpose.