Philosophers often state that the persistence of objects in vision is experienced differently than the persistence of sounds in audition. This difference is expressed by using metaphors from the metaphysical endurantism/perdurantism debate. For instance, it is claimed that only sounds are perceived as “temporally extended”. The paper investigates whether it is justified to characterize visually experienced objects and auditorily experienced sounds as different types of entities: endurants and perdurants respectively. This issue is analyzed from the perspective of major specifications of (...) the endurance/perdurance distinction connected, inter alia, with the notions of temporal parts and temporal localization. It is argued that it is unjustified to characterize visually experienced objects and auditorily experienced sounds as different types of entities in respect of how they persist. On the other hand, the apparent difference in the way of persisting can be explained by the presence of contingent differences between typical visual and auditory experiences. (shrink)

According to one productive and influential approach to cognition, categorization, object recognition, and higher level cognitive processes operate on a set of fixed features, which are the output of lower level perceptual processes. In many situations, however, it is the higher level cognitive process being executed that influences the lower level features that are created. Rather than viewing the repertoire of features as being fixed by low-level processes, we present a theory in which people create features to subserve the representation (...) and categorization of objects. Two types of category learning should be distinguished. Fixed space category learning occurs when new categorizations are representable with the available feature set. Flexible space category learning occurs when new categorizations cannot be represented with the features available. Whether fixed or flexible, learning depends on the featural contrasts and similarities between the new category to be represented and the individual's existing concepts. Fixed feature approaches face one of two problems with tasks that call for new features: If the fixed features are fairly high level and directly useful for categorization, then they will not be flexible enough to represent all objects that might be relevant for a new task. If the fixed features are small, subsymbolic fragments (such as pixels), then regularities at the level of the functional features required to accomplish categorizations will not be captured by these primitives. We present evidence of flexible perceptual changes arising from category learning and theoretical arguments for the importance of this flexibility. We describe conditions that promote feature creation and argue against interpreting them in terms of fixed features. Finally, we discuss the implications of functional features for object categorization, conceptual development, chunking, constructive induction, and formal models of dimensionality reduction. Key Words: concept learning; conceptual development; features; perceptual learning; stimulus encoding. (shrink)

Previous research found that application of eyeshadow on the upper eyelids induces overestimation of eye size. The present study examined whether this eyeshadow illusion is dependent on or independent of viewpoint. We created a three-dimensional model of a female face and manipulated the presence/absence of eyeshadow and face orientation around the axis of yaw (Experiment 1) or pitch (Experiment 2) rotation. Using the staircase method, we measured perceived eye size for each face stimulus. Results showed that the eyeshadow illusion occurred (...) regardless of face orientation around axes of both yaw and pitch rotations. Crucially, the illusion’s magnitude did not vary across face orientations; lack of interaction between the illusion’s magnitude and face orientation was confirmed by small values of Bayes factors. These findings ruled out the hypothesis that eyeshadow serves as a depth cue and leads to overestimation of eye size due to size-distance scaling. Alternatively, the present findings suggest that the eyeshadow illusion can be well explained by the assimilation between the eyes and eyeshadow, which also facilitates assimilation between the eyes and eyebrows. Practical implications and the present findings’ generalizability are also discussed. (shrink)

Some years ago Cheung et al. (2008) proposed the complete design (CD) for measuring the failure of selective attention in composite objects. Since the CD is a fully balanced design, analysis of response bias may reveal potential effects of the experimental manipulation, the stimulus material, and/or attributes of the observers. Here we used the CD to prove whether external features modulate perception of internal features with the context congruency paradigm (Meinhardt-Injac et al., 2010; Nachson et al., 1995) in a larger (...) sample of N = 303 subjects. We found a large congruency effect (Cohen’s d = 1.78), which was attenuated by face inversion (d = 1.32). The congruency relation also strongly modulated response bias. In incongruent trials the proportion of “different” responses was much larger than in congruent trials (d = 0.79), which was again attenuated by face inversion (d = 0.43). Because in incongruent trials the wholes formed by integrating external and internal features are always different, while in congruent trials same and different wholes occur with the same frequency, a congruency related bias effect is expected from holistic integration. Our results suggest two behavioral markers of holistic processing in the context congruency paradigm: a performance advantage in congruent compared to incongruent trials, and a tendency towards more “different” responses in incongruent, compared to congruent trials. Since the results for both markers differed only quantitatively in upright and inverted presentation, our findings indicate no change of the face processing mode by picture plane rotation. A potential transfer to the composite face paradigm is discussed. (shrink)

Facial information is a powerful channel for human-to-human communication. Characteristically, faces can be defined as biological objects that are four-dimensional (4D) patterns, whereby they have concurrently a spatial structure as well as temporal dynamics. The spatial characteristics of facial objects possess three dimensions (3D), namely breadth, height and importantly, depth. The temporal properties of facial objects are defined by how a 3D facial structure evolves dynamically over time; where time is referred to as the fourth dimension (4D). Our entire perspective (...) of another’s face, whether it be social, affective or cognitive perceptions, is therefore built on a combination of 3D and 4D visual cues. Counterintuitively, over the past few decades of experimental research in psychology, facial stimuli have largely been presented to participants as a spatial pattern that has been flattened into two dimensions (2D), while remaining largely static. The following review aims to advance and update facial researchers, on the recent revolution in computer-generated, realistic 4D facial models produced from real-life human subjects. We delve in-depth to summarize recent studies which have utilized facial stimuli that possess 3D structural cues (geometry and depth) and 4D temporal cues (3D structure + dynamic viewpoint and movement). In sum, we have found that higher-order perceptions such as identity, gender, ethnicity, emotion and personality, are critically influenced by the 4D characteristics embedded within natural human faces. In future, it is recommended that facial stimuli incorporate the 4D space-time perspective with the proposed time-resolved methods. (shrink)