Watson H D
J Exp Psychol Gen. 1981 Dec;110(4):547-67. doi: 10.1037//0096-3445.110.4.547.
The present experiments examined the effect of perceived size on the time it takes to make veridical form judgments. Recent studies have demonstrated an increase in the time required to match forms, as a function of increasing size, orientation, contrast, or color differences between the forms to be matched. The increase in reaction time to match forms has been explained by suggesting that form perception and matching is dependent on the degree of difference that exists in the objective size of the forms to be matched. This conflicts with the generally accepted view that form matching is independent of irrelevant proximal stimulus properties. The key to this issue seems to be whether form perception depends on objective or perceived stimulus properties. Studies in this area all involve manipulations of the objective stimulus properties, thus making it difficult to examine the effects of perceived properties. The current series of studies decoupled objective and perceived size differences by employing an illusion. The results demonstrated that the time to match forms is a function perceived differences in the stimulus forms, not the differences that exist in the objective size of the forms to be matched. In Experiment 1 three conditions were employed: a plain background condition in which the forms to be matched were objectively and subjectively equal in size, a double-illusion condition in which the forms were objectively and subjectively equal in size, and an illusion condition in which the forms were objectively equal in size but perceived as unequal in size. The results indicated a significant increase in reaction time for the illusion condition in which the forms were perceived to be different sizes, compared to the other two conditions in which perceived and objective size were equal. Experiment 2 results converged with and replicated those of Experiment 1. In Experiment 2 perceived size was equated for each subject in the context of the size illusion, thus varying the objective size of the stimuli. This manipulation led to a significant decrease in reaction time in this added condition, as compared to the illusion condition from Experiment 1 in which objective size was equal and perceived size differed. The results of Experiment 2 were replicated in a third experiment. Experiment 3 replicated the decrease in reaction time noted in the perceptually equal illusion condition. The decrease between illusion conditions was also approximated by an increase in a plain background condition with objective size differences. Thus the effect of perceived size accounts for the additional time to match forms of unequal size. The conclusion drawn from this series of experiments is that the time required to make veridical form judgments depends on perceived differences in the forms to be judged, not on the objective properties of the proximal stimulus. Implications of these results on models of pattern recognition are examined.
本实验研究了感知大小对做出准确形状判断所需时间的影响。最近的研究表明，随着要匹配的形状之间大小、方向、对比度或颜色差异的增加，匹配形状所需的时间也会增加。形状匹配反应时间的增加被解释为，形状感知和匹配取决于要匹配的形状在客观大小上存在的差异程度。这与形状匹配独立于无关近端刺激属性这一普遍接受的观点相冲突。这个问题的关键似乎在于形状感知是取决于客观刺激属性还是感知刺激属性。该领域的研究都涉及对客观刺激属性的操纵，因此难以研究感知属性的影响。当前这一系列研究通过运用一种错觉，将客观大小差异与感知大小差异分离开来。结果表明，形状匹配时间是刺激形状感知差异的函数，而不是要匹配的形状在客观大小上存在的差异的函数。在实验1中采用了三种条件：一种是纯色背景条件，其中要匹配的形状在客观和主观上大小相等；一种是双重错觉条件，其中形状在客观和主观上大小相等；还有一种是错觉条件，其中形状在客观上大小相等，但被感知为大小不等。结果表明，与其他两种感知和客观大小相等的条件相比，在形状被感知为大小不同的错觉条件下，反应时间显著增加。实验2的结果与实验1的结果一致并重复了其实验结果。在实验2中，在大小错觉的情境下为每个受试者设定了感知大小相等的条件，从而改变了刺激的客观大小。与实验1中客观大小相等但感知大小不同的错觉条件相比，这种操作导致在这个附加条件下反应时间显著减少。实验2的结果在第三个实验中得到了重复。实验3重复了在感知相等错觉条件下观察到的反应时间减少情况。在纯色背景条件下客观大小存在差异时，反应时间的增加也近似于错觉条件之间的减少情况。因此，感知大小的影响解释了匹配大小不等的形状时所需的额外时间。从这一系列实验得出的结论是，做出准确形状判断所需的时间取决于要判断的形状的感知差异，而不是近端刺激的客观属性。本文还探讨了这些结果对模式识别模型的影响。
