State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Science, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
J Vis. 2020 Sep 2;20(9):9. doi: 10.1167/jov.20.9.9.
In the crowding effect, object recognition in the periphery deteriorates when other items flank the target, especially if they share similarities. Here, we report that the similarity defined by topological property (differences in number of holes) influences the crowding effect. Orientation discrimination tasks suggested that the crowding effect was weaker with a topological different (TD) flanker than a topological equivalent (TE) flanker and an existing inward-outward anisotropy phenomenon. In another experiment, both an outer and an inner flanker were used to constitute four different conditions. The performance of an outer TD flanker and an inner TE flanker was superior to that of an outer TE flanker and an inner TD flanker, even though the items of the stimuli were the same. Different stimuli were used to control for local features. To eliminate the possible explanation of confusability, we selected pairs of letters with matched confusability, but one pair was TD and another was TE. The letter identification performance was better for the TD condition. Lastly, we investigated the digit identification under four conditions with varied spacing. Regardless of different spacing, the crowding effect was reduced by a topological different flanker. The results collectively suggest that topological property plays a role in the perceptual grouping, which modulates the crowding effect.
在拥挤效应中，当目标周围有其他物体时，特别是当它们具有相似特征时，目标的周边物体识别会恶化。本文报告了拓扑属性（孔数差异）定义的相似性会影响拥挤效应。方向辨别任务表明，拓扑不同（TD）的侧翼比拓扑相同（TE）的侧翼以及现有的内外向各向异性现象的拥挤效应更弱。在另一项实验中，使用外框和内框来构成四种不同的条件。外框 TD 侧翼和内框 TE 侧翼的表现优于外框 TE 侧翼和内框 TD 侧翼，即使刺激的项目是相同的。使用不同的刺激来控制局部特征。为了消除混淆的可能解释，我们选择了匹配混淆度的字母对，但一对是 TD，另一对是 TE。TD 条件下的字母识别性能更好。最后，我们在四种不同间距的条件下研究了数字识别。无论间距如何，拓扑不同的侧翼都会减少拥挤效应。结果表明，拓扑属性在知觉分组中起作用，从而调节了拥挤效应。
