How spatial frequencies and color drive object search in real-world scenes
- When studying how people search for objects in scenes, the inhomogeneity of the visual field is often ignored. Due to physiological limitations, peripheral vision is blurred and mainly uses coarse-grained information (i.e., low spatial frequencies) for selecting saccade targets, whereas high-acuity central vision uses fine-grained information (i.e., high spatial frequencies) for analysis of details. Here we investigated how spatial frequencies and color affect object search in real-world scenes. Using gaze-contingent filters, we attenuated high or low frequencies in central or peripheral vision while viewers searched color or grayscale scenes. Results showed that peripheral filters and central high-pass filters hardly affected search accuracy, whereas accuracy dropped drastically with central low-pass filters. Peripheral filtering increased the time to localize the target by decreasing saccade amplitudes and increasing number and duration of fixations. The use of coarse-grained information in the periphery was limited to color scenes.When studying how people search for objects in scenes, the inhomogeneity of the visual field is often ignored. Due to physiological limitations, peripheral vision is blurred and mainly uses coarse-grained information (i.e., low spatial frequencies) for selecting saccade targets, whereas high-acuity central vision uses fine-grained information (i.e., high spatial frequencies) for analysis of details. Here we investigated how spatial frequencies and color affect object search in real-world scenes. Using gaze-contingent filters, we attenuated high or low frequencies in central or peripheral vision while viewers searched color or grayscale scenes. Results showed that peripheral filters and central high-pass filters hardly affected search accuracy, whereas accuracy dropped drastically with central low-pass filters. Peripheral filtering increased the time to localize the target by decreasing saccade amplitudes and increasing number and duration of fixations. The use of coarse-grained information in the periphery was limited to color scenes. Central filtering increased the time to verify target identity instead, especially with low-pass filters. We conclude that peripheral vision is critical for object localization and central vision is critical for object identification. Visual guidance during peripheral object localization is dominated by low-frequency color information, whereas high-frequency information, relatively independent of color, is most important for object identification in central vision.…
Author details: | Anke CajarORCiDGND, Ralf EngbertORCiDGND, Jochen LaubrockORCiDGND |
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DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.20.7.8 |
ISSN: | 1534-7362 |
Title of parent work (English): | Journal of vision |
Subtitle (English): | a new eye-movement corpus |
Publisher: | Association for Research in Vision and Opthalmology |
Place of publishing: | Rockville |
Publication type: | Article |
Language: | English |
Date of first publication: | 2020/07/13 |
Publication year: | 2020 |
Release date: | 2023/03/31 |
Tag: | central and peripheral; color; eye movements; gaze-contingent displays; object search; scene viewing; spatial frequencies; vision |
Volume: | 20 |
Issue: | 7 |
Article number: | 8 |
Number of pages: | 16 |
Funding institution: | Deutsche ForschungsgemeinschaftGerman Research Foundation (DFG) [LA; 2884/1, EN 471/10] |
Organizational units: | Humanwissenschaftliche Fakultät / Strukturbereich Kognitionswissenschaften / Department Psychologie |
DDC classification: | 6 Technik, Medizin, angewandte Wissenschaften / 61 Medizin und Gesundheit / 610 Medizin und Gesundheit |
Peer review: | Referiert |
Publishing method: | Open Access / Gold Open-Access |
License (German): | CC-BY-NC-ND - Namensnennung, nicht kommerziell, keine Bearbeitungen 4.0 International |