People can recognize the meaning or gist of a scene from a single glance, and a few recent studies have begun to examine the sorts of information that contribute to scene gist recognition. The authors of the present study used visual masking coupled with image manipulations (randomizing phase while maintaining the Fourier amplitude spectrum;…

Comments on an article by Bressan. Recently, a double-anchoring theory (DAT) of lightness perception was proposed (P. Bressan, 2006), which offers explanations for all the data explained by the original anchoring theory (A. Gilchrist et al., 1999), as well as a number of additional lightness phenomena. Consequently, DAT can account for an…

Embodied theories of cognition hold that mentally representing something "red" engages the neural subsystems that respond to environmental perception of that colour. This paper examines whether implicit perceptual information on object colour is represented during sentence comprehension even though doing so does not necessarily facilitate task…

Perceptual load theory offers a resolution to the long-standing early vs. late selection debate over whether task-irrelevant stimuli are perceived, suggesting that irrelevant perception depends upon the perceptual load of task-relevant processing. However, previous evidence for this theory has relied on RTs and neuroimaging. Here we tested the…

Supported by Grant MH-08748 from the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Public Health Service, and by Grant 9425-08 from the Defense Research Board, Canada.

Appraises current explanations of how visual processing occurs. Highlights the basics of simultaneous and serial levels of processing. Discusses the results of a series of experiments on visual-search tasks and also on the role of prior knowledge in processing. (ML)

Describes experiments which focus on the perception of three dimensions. Discusses the cues about distance and depth and the role they have in perceptions of three dimensions. Evaluates the effect of color on the illusion on depth. (ML)

Two groups of 15 boys (mean age 8 years, mean IQ 100), both presenting difficulties in academic achievement, but one with and one without visuomotor impairments, were assessed to determine whether poor drawing ability was related to perceptual or motor disorders. (Author)

Schools should probably spend more time developing student awareness of learning styles than pushing teachers into more inservice workshops on adapting curriculum. The Learning Channel Preference Checklist included in this article allows students to assess their own preferred learning style(s) by choosing statements stressing visual, auditory, or…

Emphasizes the role that motor development may play in determining developmental sequences in other domains, such as haptic or tactile perception and depth perception. Maintains that there is a high degree of fit between the developmental sequence in which certain perceptual sensitivities unfold and the ages at which the corresponding motor…

The purposes of this investigation were to compare an individual's magnitude and direction of error in three tests of kinesthetic perception, and to determine whether individuals tend generally to reduce, augment, or moderate stimuli on all three tests. A single group design was employed, using a sample of 34 male students. The variables of joint…

A study investigated how children between ages 5 and 11 perceive three types of film transition. A second purpose was to determine if there was an emergent recognition pattern among these three types of film transition devices: image magnification on a cut (a camera transition), lap dissolve (an optical transition), and clean exit (a subject…

A study was devised to determine whether, if color is found superior to black-and-white for communicating dynamic picture content, that superiority can be attributed to the realism of authentic color, or whether that superiority is the effect of the simple presence of color. A sample of 90 sixth grade students were shown slides, half of which…