Paper presented at the Australasian Experimental Psychology Conference 2015, 8-11 April 2015, Sydney, Australia

Goodison, Jordan

Palmisano, Stephen

Philbeck, John W

English

Research Online

University of WollongongResearch OnlineFaculty of Social Sciences - Papers Faculty of Social Sciences2015Ground continuity and distance perception: Aninvestigation of the effect of texture discontinuityon perceived distanceJordan GoodisonUniversity of Wollongong, goodison@uow.edu.auJohn W. PhilbeckUniversity of Wollongong, johnp@uow.edu.auStephen PalmisanoUniversity of Wollongong, stephenp@uow.edu.auResearch Online is the open access institutional repository for the University of Wollongong. For further information contact the UOW Library:research-pubs@uow.edu.auPublication DetailsGoodison, J., Philbeck, J. & Palmisano, S. (2015). Ground continuity and distance perception: An investigation of the effect of texturediscontinuity on perceived distance. Australasian Experimental Psychology Conference 2015Ground continuity and distance perception: An investigation of the effectof texture discontinuity on perceived distanceAbstractPaper presented at the Australasian Experimental Psychology Conference 2015, 8-11 April 2015, Sydney,Australia.Keywordsperception, investigation, effect, texture, ground, continuity, discontinuity, distance, perceivedDisciplinesEducation | Social and Behavioral SciencesPublication DetailsGoodison, J., Philbeck, J. & Palmisano, S. (2015). Ground continuity and distance perception: Aninvestigation of the effect of texture discontinuity on perceived distance. Australasian ExperimentalPsychology Conference 2015This conference paper is available at Research Online: http://ro.uow.edu.au/sspapers/1584	  Selective	  spatial	  enhancement:	  Attentional	  spotlight	  size	  impacts	  spatial	  but	  not	  temporal	  perception	  Stephanie	  C.	  Goodhew,	  Elizabeth	  Shen,	  Mark	  Edwards	  The	  Australian	  National	  University	  stephanie.goodhew@anu.edu.au	  Spatial	  attention	  is	  a	  core	  visual	  mechanism	  that	  selects	  certain	  aspects	  of	  a	  visual	  scene	  for	  preferential	  processing	  while	  minimising	  the	  processing	  of	  others,	  so	  as	  not	  to	  overwhelm	  our	  limited-­‐capacity	  processing	  resources.	  An	  important	  but	  often	  neglected	  aspect	  of	  attention	  is	  how	  changes	  in	  the	  attentional	  spotlight	  size	  impact	  perception.	  The	  zoom-­‐lens	  model	  predicts	  that	  a	  small	  (‘focal’)	  attentional	  spotlight	  enhances	  all	  aspects	  of	  perception	  relative	  to	  a	  larger	  (‘diffuse’	  spotlight).	  However,	  based	  on	  the	  physiological	  properties	  of	  the	  two	  major	  classes	  of	  visual	  cells	  (magnocellular	  and	  parvocellular	  neurons),	  we	  predicted	  trade-­‐offs	  in	  spatial	  and	  temporal	  acuity	  as	  a	  function	  of	  spotlight	  size.	  Contrary	  to	  both	  of	  these	  accounts,	  however,	  across	  two	  experiments	  we	  found	  that	  attentional	  spotlight	  size	  affected	  spatial	  acuity,	  such	  that	  spatial	  acuity	  was	  enhanced	  for	  a	  focal	  relative	  to	  a	  diffuse	  spotlight,	  whereas	  the	  same	  modulations	  in	  spotlight	  size	  had	  no	  impact	  on	  temporal	  acuity.	  This	  likely	  reflects	  the	  function	  of	  attention:	  to	  induce	  the	  high	  spatial	  resolution	  of	  the	  fovea	  in	  periphery,	  where	  spatial	  resolution	  is	  poor	  but	  temporal	  resolution	  is	  good.	  It	  is	  adaptive,	  therefore,	  for	  the	  attentional	  spotlight	  to	  enhance	  spatial	  acuity,	  whereas	  enhancing	  temporal	  acuity	  does	  not	  confer	  the	  same	  benefit.	  	  Ground	  Continuity	  and	  Distance	  Perception:	  An	  Investigation	  of	  the	  Effect	  of	  Texture	  Discontinuity	  on	  Perceived	  Distance	  Jordan	  Goodison,	  John	  Philbeck	  &	  Stephen	  Palmisano	  University	  of	  Wollongong	  jordan.goodison@gmail.com	  The	  ground	  plane	  is	  thought	  to	  be	  important	  in	  perceiving	  intermediate	  distances	  (2-­‐25m).	  Sequential	  Surface	  Integration	  Process	  (SSIP)	  theory	  proposes	  that	  a	  continuously	  textured	  ground	  surface	  is	  needed	  to	  accurately	  localise	  objects	  at	  such	  distances	  (especially	  as	  distance	  increases).	  There	  are	  a	  number	  of	  ways	  to	  manipulate	  texture	  continuity	  of	  the	  ground	  plane,	  many	  of	  which	  have	  been	  empirically	  tested	  and	  shown	  to	  result	  in	  systematic	  distance	  underestimation.	  In	  the	  current	  experiment,	  observers	  were	  instructed	  to	  indicate	  the	  distance	  to	  an	  object	  located	  at	  ground	  level	  using	  a	  modified	  blind-­‐walking	  task.	  We	  manipulated	  ground	  plane	  texture	  discontinuity	  using	  a	  simple,	  yet	  effective	  approach;	  by	  placing	  a	  strip	  of	  material	  level	  with	  the	  grass	  covered	  ground	  plane,	  effectively	  occluding	  the	  grass	  texture	  between	  the	  viewer	  and	  the	  target.	  Contrary	  to	  the	  predictions	  of	  SSIP	  theory,	  we	  found	  no	  performance	  advantage	  associated	  with	  viewing	  targets	  across	  a	  continuous	  ground	  surface,	  as	  compared	  to	  when	  we	  occluded	  the	  texture	  of	  the	  ground	  surface.	  To	  further	  explore	  the	  effects	  of	  texture	  continuity,	  we	  attempted	  to	  replicate	  another	  ground	  manipulation	  that	  has	  previously	  been	  shown	  to	  affect	  distance	  perception	  by	  occluding	  the	  ground	  surface	  with	  a	  rectangular	  box.	  	  Investigating	  the	  role	  of	  perceptual	  assimilation	  in	  the	  effectiveness	  of	  second-­‐language	  perceptual	  training	  Kimberley	  M.	  Gordon	  &	  Michael	  D.	  Tyler	  University	  of	  Western	  Sydney	  m.tyler@uws.edu.au	  The	  Perceptual	  Assimilation	  Model	  of	  Second	  Language	  Speech	  Learning	  (PAM-­‐L2)	  predicts	  that	  a	  new	  second-­‐language	  (L2)	  phoneme	  category	  is	  more	  likely	  to	  be	  formed	  when	  learners	  detect	  a	  goodness-­‐of-­‐fit	  difference	  between	  similar-­‐sounding	  non-­‐native	  phonemes	  (a	  category-­‐goodness	  assimilation)	  than	  when	  the	  phonemes	  sound	  similar	  to	  each	  other	  (a	  single-­‐category	  assimilation).	  Although	  PAM-­‐L2	  was	  devised	  to	  account	  for	  L2	  acquisition	  in	  a	  naturalistic	  setting,	  the	  same	  predictions	  should	  apply	  to	  perceptual	  training	  in	  the	  laboratory.	  To	  test	  this,	  Australian-­‐English	  listeners	  were	  assigned	  to	  one	  of	  two	  training	  conditions,	  single-­‐category	  or	  category-­‐goodness,	  and	  completed	  discrimination	  tasks	  with	  Arabic	  fricative	  contrasts:	  a	  pre-­‐training	  AXB	  discrimination	  task	  with	  a	  single	  speaker	  and	  no	  feedback,	  six	  blocks	  of	  training	  on	  AX	  discrimination	  with	  feedback	  using	  three	  different	  speakers,	  and	  a	  post-­‐training	  AXB	  discrimination	  task	  with	  the	  single	  speaker.	  Performance	  improved	  on	  AXB	  discrimination	  from	  pre-­‐	  to	  post-­‐training,	  but	  there	  was	  no	  interaction	  with	  assimilation	  type.	  This	  suggests	  that	  training	  is	  equally	  effective	  for	  category-­‐goodness	  and	  single-­‐category	  assimilations.	  However,	  performance	  did	  not	  improve	  

Ground continuity and distance perception: An investigation of the effect of texture discontinuity on perceived distance

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Ground continuity and distance perception: An investigation of the effect of texture discontinuity on perceived distance

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