Document Detail


Determining the point of subjective ambiguity of ambiguous biological-motion figures with perspective cues.
MedLine Citation:
PMID:  20160296     Owner:  NLM     Status:  MEDLINE    
Abstract/OtherAbstract:
Orthographic frontal/back projections of biological-motion figures are bistable: The point-light figure in principle can be perceived either as facing toward the viewer or as facing away from the viewer. Some point-light actions--for example, walking--elicit a strong "facing bias": Despite the absence of objective cues to depth, observers tend to interpret the figure as facing toward the viewer in most of the cases. In this article, we present and experimentally validate a technique that affords full experimental control of the perceived in-depth orientation of point-light figures. We demonstrate that by parametrically manipulating the amount of perspective information in the stimulus, it is possible to obtain any desired level of subjective ambiguity. Directions for future research, in which this technique can be fruitfully implemented, are suggested. Program code of a demo is provided that can be modified easily for program code of new experiments. The demo and QuickTime movie files illustrating our perspective manipulation technique may be downloaded from http://brm.psychonomic-journals.org/content/supplemental.
Authors:
Ben Schouten; Karl Verfaillie
Related Documents :
19304626 - Computation of mean size is based on perceived size.
10571236 - Motion-based mechanisms of illusory contour synthesis.
1005016 - A figure-density hypothesis and illusory contour brightness.
17239916 - Kaleidoscopic motion and velocity illusions.
20404396 - An online brain-computer interface using non-flashing visual evoked potentials.
22504546 - Ecological opportunity and diversification in a continental radiation of birds: climbin...
Publication Detail:
Type:  Journal Article; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't    
Journal Detail:
Title:  Behavior research methods     Volume:  42     ISSN:  1554-3528     ISO Abbreviation:  Behav Res Methods     Publication Date:  2010 Feb 
Date Detail:
Created Date:  2010-02-17     Completed Date:  2010-05-20     Revised Date:  -    
Medline Journal Info:
Nlm Unique ID:  101244316     Medline TA:  Behav Res Methods     Country:  United States    
Other Details:
Languages:  eng     Pagination:  161-7     Citation Subset:  IM    
Affiliation:
University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium. ben.schouten@psy.kuleuven.be
Export Citation:
APA/MLA Format     Download EndNote     Download BibTex
MeSH Terms
Descriptor/Qualifier:
Cues
Humans
Motion Perception*
Visual Perception
Walking

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine


Previous Document:  A comparison of blindpulling and blindwalking as measures of perceived absolute distance.
Next Document:  Inferring intentions from biological motion: A stimulus set of point-light communicative interaction...