-
Attention, Perception & Psychophysics Aug 2019Crowding refers to the phenomenon of reduced recognition performance for peripherally presented targets that are flanked by similar stimuli. Crowding is known to vary...
Crowding refers to the phenomenon of reduced recognition performance for peripherally presented targets that are flanked by similar stimuli. Crowding is known to vary with lateral distances (i.e., effects of target eccentricity and inter-character spacing). In the present experiment, we examined how crowding is affected by the distance of the stimuli in depth for natural viewing, i.e., for binocular observation of a real depth presentation. Superimposing the displays of two orthogonally arranged screens with a half-transparent mirror created real-depth presentation. We measured recognition performance of flanked compared to isolated targets that were presented at fixation depth, or in depths deviating from fixation depth (defocused). For both defocused directions (i.e., in front of and behind fixation depth), a near as well as a far distance from fixation was applied. Participants' task was to fixate a central cross at a constant distance (190 cm), and to indicate the gap position of an isolated or flanked Landolt ring that was presented at an eccentricity of 2°, on, in front of, or behind fixation depth. Results for natural binocular observation revealed increased crowding effects when stimuli were far compared to near from the fixation plane in depth. This resembles the common effect of eccentricity. Under monocular viewing, that is, without disparity information, crowding did not increase with increased depth distance. Thus, the result seemed to be an effect of binocular observation in real depth. This suggests that crowding in natural viewing might serve as a mechanism to stabilize and orient attention efficiently in three-dimensional space.
Topics: Crowding; Depth Perception; Female; Humans; Male; Vision, Binocular; Vision, Monocular; Young Adult
PubMed: 30887382
DOI: 10.3758/s13414-019-01700-z -
Perception Sep 2020Virtual reality systems are a popular tool in behavioral sciences. The participants' behavior is, however, a response to cognitively processed stimuli. Consequently,... (Comparative Study)
Comparative Study Review
Virtual reality systems are a popular tool in behavioral sciences. The participants' behavior is, however, a response to cognitively processed stimuli. Consequently, researchers must ensure that virtually perceived stimuli resemble those present in the real world to ensure the ecological validity of collected findings. Our article provides a literature review relating to distance perception in virtual reality. Furthermore, we present a new study that compares verbal distance estimates within real and virtual environments. The virtual space-a replica of a real outdoor area-was displayed using a state-of-the-art head-mounted display. Investigated distances ranged from 8 to 13 m. Overall, the results show no significant difference between egocentric distance estimates in real and virtual environments. However, a more in-depth analysis suggests that the order in which participants were exposed to the two environments may affect the outcome. Furthermore, the study suggests that a rising experience of immersion leads to an alignment of the estimated virtual distances with the real ones. The results also show that the discrepancy between estimates of real and virtual distances increases with the incongruity between virtual and actual eye heights, demonstrating the importance of an accurately set virtual eye height.
Topics: Adult; Distance Perception; Female; Humans; Male; Virtual Reality; Visual Perception; Young Adult
PubMed: 33002392
DOI: 10.1177/0301006620951997 -
Scientific Reports May 2022Motion-in-depth perception is critical in enabling animals to avoid hazards and respond to potential threats. For humans, important visual cues for motion-in-depth...
Motion-in-depth perception is critical in enabling animals to avoid hazards and respond to potential threats. For humans, important visual cues for motion-in-depth include changing disparity (CD) and changing image size (CS). The interpretation and integration of these cues depends upon multiple scene parameters, such as distance moved, object size and viewing distance, posing a significant computational challenge. We show that motion-in-depth cue integration depends upon sensitivity to the joint probabilities of the scene parameters determining these signals, and on the probability of CD and CS signals co-occurring. Models that took these factors into account predicted human performance in speed-in-depth and cue conflict discrimination tasks, where standard linear integration models could not. These results suggest that cue integration is affected by both the uncertainty of sensory signals and the mapping of those signals to real-world properties. Evidence of a role for such mappings demonstrates the importance of scene and image statistics to the processes underpinning cue integration and the perception of motion-in-depth.
Topics: Cues; Depth Perception; Motion; Motion Perception; Vision Disparity
PubMed: 35562584
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-12051-5 -
Journal of Optometry 2022The purpose of our work is to do an update of recent investigations about amblyopia treatment based on perceptual learning, dichoptic training and videogames. Therefore,... (Review)
Review
The purpose of our work is to do an update of recent investigations about amblyopia treatment based on perceptual learning, dichoptic training and videogames. Therefore, we conducted a search of the studies published about this subject in the last six years. The review shows that the investigations during that period have used several kinds of treatments regarding their design (e.g., type of stimulus and context used, duration of the training), and in a wider range of age that also include adults. Most of the studies have found an improvement in some mono and binocular visual functions, such as visual acuity, contrast sensitivity and stereopsis, which for now, it seems advisable that these processes could be used, as an alternative or a complement of the traditional passive therapy. Nevertheless, it would be plausible to conduct additional, controlled and random, clinical trials in order to discover in a more deeply way which perceptive learning method of treatment is more effective for the improvement of visual functions and for how long the effects of the treatment could persist.
Topics: Adult; Amblyopia; Contrast Sensitivity; Depth Perception; Humans; Vision, Binocular; Visual Acuity
PubMed: 33243673
DOI: 10.1016/j.optom.2020.08.002 -
Current Biology : CB Aug 2019Monovision is a common prescription lens correction for presbyopia [1]. Each eye is corrected for a different distance, causing one image to be blurrier than the other....
Monovision is a common prescription lens correction for presbyopia [1]. Each eye is corrected for a different distance, causing one image to be blurrier than the other. Millions of people have monovision corrections, but little is known about how interocular blur differences affect motion perception. Here, we report that blur differences cause a previously unknown motion illusion that makes people dramatically misperceive the distance and three-dimensional direction of moving objects. The effect occurs because the blurry and sharp images are processed at different speeds. For moving objects, the mismatch in processing speed causes a neural disparity, which results in the misperceptions. A variant of a 100-year-old stereo-motion phenomenon called the Pulfrich effect [2], the illusion poses an apparent paradox: blur reduces contrast, and contrast reductions are known to cause neural processing delays [3-6], but our results indicate that blurry images are processed milliseconds more quickly. We resolve the paradox with known properties of the early visual system, show that the misperceptions can be severe enough to impact public safety, and demonstrate that the misperceptions can be eliminated with novel combinations of non-invasive ophthalmic interventions. The fact that substantial perceptual errors are caused by millisecond differences in processing speed highlights the exquisite temporal calibration required for accurate perceptual estimation. The motion illusion-the reverse Pulfrich effect-and the paradigm we use to measure it should help reveal how optical and image properties impact temporal processing, an important but understudied issue in vision and visual neuroscience.
Topics: Adult; Depth Perception; Female; Humans; Illusions; Male; Motion; Motion Perception; Presbyopia; Vision, Monocular; Young Adult
PubMed: 31353183
DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2019.06.070 -
Clinical & Experimental Optometry Jan 2023The synoptophore has been used clinically to assess simultaneous perception and sensory fusion in strabismic patients; however, due to suppression or the visual...
CLINICAL RELEVANCE
The synoptophore has been used clinically to assess simultaneous perception and sensory fusion in strabismic patients; however, due to suppression or the visual condition of patients with normal stereopsis, a synoptophore does not always detect simultaneous perception or sensory fusion. A cheiroscope may be a better alternative.
BACKGROUND
The aim of this work was ro determine whether a cheiroscope could be useful for examining simultaneous perception and sensory fusion in strabismus patients.
METHODS
Thirty-three patients with strabismus who could undergo cheiroscopic tracing were categorised into two groups: the intermittent exotropia group (XT; n = 19; mean age 9.8 ± 5.6 yrs, range 5-23 yrs) and the esotropia group (ET; n = 14; mean age 10.2 ± 6.0 yrs, range 4-23 yrs). Two sizes of square line drawings (20° and 6°) were used for the cheiroscopic tracing. The cheiroscopic tracing results were compared with those of synoptophore testing for simultaneous perception and sensory fusion.
RESULTS
The rate of cheiroscopic tracing of detecting sensory fusion was significantly higher than that of the synoptophore. With the synoptophore, simultaneous perception was detected in 89.5% and 85.7% of the XT and ET patients, and sensory fusion was detected in 73.7% and 71.4%, respectively. The synoptophore identified 11 patients who had no simultaneous perception or sensory fusion. Among them, eight patients were associated with suppression and two patients were 4 years old.
CONCLUSION
Cheiroscopic tracing is useful for determining the presence of simultaneous perception and sensory fusion if they are not detected by a synoptophore due to age < 5 years or suppression.
Topics: Humans; Child, Preschool; Child; Adolescent; Young Adult; Adult; Vision, Binocular; Strabismus; Esotropia; Depth Perception; Exotropia
PubMed: 34875209
DOI: 10.1080/08164622.2021.2011150 -
Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual... Sep 2021Our visual system compares the inputs received from the two eyes to estimate the relative depths of features in the retinal image. We investigated how an imbalance in...
PURPOSE
Our visual system compares the inputs received from the two eyes to estimate the relative depths of features in the retinal image. We investigated how an imbalance in the strength of the input received from the two eyes affects stereopsis. We also explored the level of agreement between different measurements of sensory eye imbalance.
METHODS
We measured the sensory eye imbalance and stereoacuity of 30 normally sighted participants. We made our measurements using a modified amblyoscope. The sensory eye imbalance was assessed through three methods: the difference between monocular contrast thresholds, the difference in dichoptic masking weight, and the contribution of each eye to a fused binocular percept. We referred them as the "threshold imbalance," "masking imbalance," and "fusion imbalance," respectively. The stereoacuity threshold was measured by having subjects discriminate which of four circles were displaced in depth. All of our tests were performed using stimuli of the same spatial frequency (2.5 cycles/degree).
RESULTS
We found a relationship between stereoacuity and sensory eye imbalance. However, this was only the case for fusion imbalance measurement (ρ = 0.52; P = 0.003). Neither the threshold imbalance nor the masking imbalance was significantly correlated with stereoacuity. We also found the threshold imbalance was correlated with both the fusion and masking imbalances (r = 0.46, P = 0.011 and r = 0.49, P = 0.005, respectively). However, a nonsignificant correlation was found between the fusion and masking imbalances.
CONCLUSIONS
Our findings suggest that there exist multiple types of sensory eye dominance that can be assessed by different tasks. We find only imbalances in dominance that result in biases to fused percepts are correlated with stereoacuity.
Topics: Adult; Aged; Amblyopia; Contrast Sensitivity; Depth Perception; Dominance, Ocular; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Perceptual Masking; Sensory Thresholds; Vision, Binocular; Visual Acuity; Young Adult
PubMed: 34515732
DOI: 10.1167/iovs.62.12.10 -
IEEE Transactions on Visualization and... Dec 2022Estimating the depth of virtual content has proven to be a challenging task in Augmented Reality (AR) applications. Existing studies have shown that the visual system...
Estimating the depth of virtual content has proven to be a challenging task in Augmented Reality (AR) applications. Existing studies have shown that the visual system makes use of multiple depth cues to infer the distance of objects, occlusion being one of the most important ones. The ability to generate appropriate occlusions becomes particularly important for AR applications that require the visualization of augmented objects placed below a real surface. Examples of these applications are medical scenarios in which the visualization of anatomical information needs to be observed within the patient's body. In this regard, existing works have proposed several focus and context (F+C) approaches to aid users in visualizing this content using Video See-Through (VST) Head-Mounted Displays (HMDs). However, the implementation of these approaches in Optical See-Through (OST) HMDs remains an open question due to the additive characteristics of the display technology. In this article, we, for the first time, design and conduct a user study that compares depth estimation between VST and OST HMDs using existing in-situ visualization methods. Our results show that these visualizations cannot be directly transferred to OST displays without increasing error in depth perception tasks. To tackle this gap, we perform a structured decomposition of the visual properties of AR F+C methods to find best-performing combinations. We propose the use of chromatic shadows and hatching approaches transferred from computer graphics. In a second study, we perform a factorized analysis of these combinations, showing that varying the shading type and using colored shadows can lead to better depth estimation when using OST HMDs.
Topics: Humans; Computer Graphics; User-Computer Interface; Equipment Design; Augmented Reality; Depth Perception
PubMed: 33979287
DOI: 10.1109/TVCG.2021.3079849 -
Journal of Vision Sep 2023Contingent on stereo compatibility, two images presented dichoptically can lead to either binocular integration, thus generating stable stereopsis, or interocular...
Contingent on stereo compatibility, two images presented dichoptically can lead to either binocular integration, thus generating stable stereopsis, or interocular suppression that induces binocular rivalry with bistable perception that alternates between the two images. The relationship between binocular integration and interocular suppression concerns how our brain processes binocular inputs to form unified visual awareness but remains unclear. Here, a series of psychophysical experiments were conducted to address this question, revealing that these collaborative and competitive binocular interactions are interconnected and would mediate one another according to their strength. Specifically, Experiments 1a and 1b showed that the presence of binocular rivalry inhibited peripheral stereopsis, significantly elevating the stereo threshold, with higher elevation resulting from increasing rivalry contrast. Experiments 2a and 2b showed that existing stereopsis with increasing binocular disparity balanced the dynamics of peripheral binocular rivalry, rendering more equivalent eye dominance. Based on these interactions, we suggest that binocular integration and interocular suppression may mediate one another through an overlapping mechanism for regulating eye dominance, with strong stereo percepts tending to reduce eye dominance and strong rivalry tending to increase eye dominance.
Topics: Humans; Vision, Binocular; Depth Perception; Brain; Dominance, Ocular; Vision Disparity
PubMed: 37750747
DOI: 10.1167/jov.23.10.17 -
Vision Research Sep 2023People with amblyopia demonstrate a reduced ability to judge depth using stereopsis. Our understanding of this deficit is limited, as standard clinical stereo tests may...
People with amblyopia demonstrate a reduced ability to judge depth using stereopsis. Our understanding of this deficit is limited, as standard clinical stereo tests may not be suited to give a quantitative account of the residual stereo ability in amblyopia. In this study we used a stereo test designed specifically for that purpose. Participants identified the location of a disparity-defined odd-one-out target within a random-dot display. We tested 29 amblyopic (3 strabismic, 17 anisometropic, 9 mixed) participants and 17 control participants. We obtained stereoacuity thresholds from 59% of our amblyopic participants. There was a factor of two difference between the median stereoacuity of our amblyopic (103 arcsec) and control (56 arcsec) groups. We used the equivalent noise method to evaluate the role of equivalent internal noise and processing efficiency in amblyopic stereopsis. Using the linear amplifier model (LAM), we determined the threshold difference was due to a greater equivalent internal noise in the amblyopic group (238 vs 135 arcsec), with no significant difference in processing efficiency. A multiple linear regression determined 56% of the stereoacuity variance within the amblyopic group was predicted by the two LAM parameters, with equivalent internal noise predicting 46% alone. Analysis of control group data aligned with our previous work, finding that trade-offs between equivalent internal noise and efficiency play a greater role. Our results allow a better understanding of what is limiting amblyopic performance in our task. We find this to be a reduced quality of disparity signals in the input to the task-specific processing.
Topics: Humans; Amblyopia; Depth Perception; Noise; Vision, Binocular; Vision, Ocular; Visual Acuity; Case-Control Studies
PubMed: 37285783
DOI: 10.1016/j.visres.2023.108267