Congruency, saliency and gist in the inspection of objects in natural scenes

Underwood, Geoffrey; Humphreys, Louise; Cross, Eleanor R.

doi:10.1016/b978-008044980-7/50028-8

Cited by 42 publications

(57 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Taken together with the overall advantage of diagnosticity for selection in both Experiment 1 and 2, this finding suggests that previous reports of earlier selection of inconsistency (e.g., Bonitz & Gordon, 2008;Brockmole & Henderson, 2008;Cornelissen & Võ, 2017;Loftus & Mackworth, 1978;Underwood et al, 2007Underwood et al, , 2008) may have arisen from comparisons with consistent but low informative objects for the scene. They might have arisen, thus, by the confusion between the dimension of informativeness, which should promote selection, with that of simple consistency, which is less important for ongoing scene perception and memory once the scene's meaning has been recognised.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 75%

The elephant in the room: Inconsistency in scene viewing and representation.

Spotorno

Tatler

2017

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Perfor

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We examined the extent to which semantic informativeness, consistency with expectations and perceptual salience contribute to object prioritisation in scene viewing and representation. In scene viewing (Experiments 1-2), semantic guidance overshadowed perceptual guidance in determining fixation order, with the greatest prioritisation for objects that were diagnostic of the scene's depicted event. Perceptual properties affected selection of consistent objects (regardless of their informativeness) but not of inconsistent objects. Semantic and perceptual properties also interacted in influencing foveal inspection, as inconsistent objects were fixated longer than low but not high salience diagnostic objects. While not studied in direct competition with each other (each studied in competition with diagnostic objects), we found that inconsistent objects were fixated earlier and for longer than consistent but marginally informative objects. In change detection (Experiment 3), perceptual guidance overshadowed semantic guidance, promoting detection of highly salient changes. A residual advantage for diagnosticity over inconsistency emerged only when selection prioritisation could not be based on low-level features. Overall these findings show that semantic inconsistency is not prioritised within a scene when competing with other relevant information that is essential to scene understanding and respects observers' expectations. Moreover, they reveal that the relative dominance of semantic or perceptual properties during selection depends on ongoing task requirements. Keywords:Semantic Consistency, Perceptual Salience, Scene Viewing, Change Detection, Eye Movements THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM 3 Public significance statement There has been long-standing debate about whether we look sooner at objects that are unexpected for the scene (i.e., semantically inconsistent objects). The present study shows that they are not prioritised over the most expected and informative objects for the event depicted in the scene (i.e., diagnostic objects), especially when these objects also stand out visually from their surroundings. Unexpected objects are looked at later, and when they are perceptually salient they slow down how quickly we select the most expected and informative objects in the scene.This study also shows that the impacts of object perceptual salience and object-scene semantic associations are task-dependent: semantics appear the most important source of guidance when viewers explore the scene for memorisation, whereas perceptual salience has a greater impact when changes have to be found. These findings provide new key insights into the roles of highand low-level factors in how we view and remember scenes. THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM 4The Elephant in the Room: Inconsistency in Scene Viewing and Representation Information selection during both online processing and memory representation is one of our fundamental and most striking abilities. Fundamental, because selection of a few, key aspects enables us to adapt and act fle...

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 75%

The elephant in the room: Inconsistency in scene viewing and representation.

Spotorno

Tatler

2017

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Perfor

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“…In line with this hypothesis, Rayner and colleagues (2009) found slightly earlier fixations on "weird" than on normal scene regions, but there was no evidence that object-scene inconsistencies attracted gaze from farther away. The same might be true for other studies that have reported results consistent with attraction of both attention and gaze toward object-scene inconsistencies (e.g., Underwood et al, 2007Underwood et al, , 2008.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 66%

“…These findings suggest that semantic object information might be processed in the visual periphery. However, experimental evidence concerning their effects on eye movement control has been mixed, with some studies suggesting that the eyes are attracted by inconsistent objects (e.g., Becker et al, 2007;Bonitz & Gordon, 2008;Loftus & Mackworth, 1978;Underwood et al, 2007;Underwood et al, 2008) and others suggesting that they are not (e.g., De Graef et al, 1990;Gareze & Findlay, 2007;Henderson et al, 1999;Võ & Henderson, 2009). Importantly, none of the studies conducted up until now have investigated the effects of initial scene processing isolated from subsequent ongoing visual processing.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Another related reason for the diverging results might lie in differences regarding mean saliency rank values of the critical objects across studies. For example, Underwood et al (2007) used objects that had a mean saliency rank value of about 3, as compared with the rest of the scene, while our objects ranked much lower in visual saliency (mean rank about 8.5). In our case, a mean rank value of about 8 implies that seven other regions in the scene were visually more conspicuous, while in the study by Underwood et al (2007), on average, only two other regions were more conspicuous.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some studies have suggested that semantic inconsistencies in the visual periphery can be detected early enough to attract eye movements (e.g., Becker, Pashler, & Lubin, 2007;Bonitz & Gordon, 2008;Loftus & Mackworth, 1978;Underwood & Foulsham, 2006;Underwood, Humphreys, & Cross, 2007;Underwood, Templeman, Lamming, & Foulsham, 2008), whereas other studies have shown no evidence that semantically inconsistent objects attract gaze prior to their fixation (e.g., De Graef, Christiaens, & d'Ydewalle, 1990;Gareze & Findlay, 2007;Henderson, Weeks, & Hollingworth, 1999;Võ & Henderson, 2009). One possible reason for the contradictory findings might be differences in the control and quality of the scene material used, which have included line drawings (e.g., De Graef et al, 1990;Henderson et al, 1999;Loftus & Mackworth, 1978), edited photographs (e.g., Rayner, Castelhano, & Yang, 2009;Underwood et al, 2007Underwood et al, , 2008, and rendered images of naturalistic scenes (Võ & Henderson, 2009). For example, in their classic "octopus in farmyard" study, Loftus and Mackworth found not only earlier fixation of inconsistent objects, but also longer saccades (of about 6.5°-8°of visual angle) entering scene regions containing an inconsistent object.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Object–scene inconsistencies do not capture gaze: evidence from the flash-preview moving-window paradigm

Võ

Henderson

2011

Atten Percept Psychophys

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In the present study, we investigated the influence of object-scene relationships on eye movement control during scene viewing. We specifically tested whether an object that is inconsistent with its scene context is able to capture gaze from the visual periphery. In four experiments, we presented rendered images of naturalistic scenes and compared baseline consistent objects with semantically, syntactically, or both semantically and syntactically inconsistent objects within those scenes. To disentangle the effects of extrafoveal and foveal objectscene processing on eye movement control, we used the flash-preview moving-window paradigm: A short scene preview was followed by an object search or free viewing of the scene, during which visual input was available only via a small gaze-contingent window. This method maximized extrafoveal processing during the preview but limited scene analysis to near-foveal regions during later stages of scene viewing. Across all experiments, there was no indication of an attraction of gaze toward object-scene inconsistencies. Rather than capturing gaze, the semantic inconsistency of an object weakened contextual guidance, resulting in impeded search performance and inefficient eye movement control. We conclude that inconsistent objects do not capture gaze from an initial glimpse of a scene.

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Attention and Memory for Newspaper Advertisements: Effects of Ad–Editorial Congruency and Location

Simola

Kivikangas

Kuisma

et al. 2013

Applied Cognitive Psychology

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SummaryPrevious research suggests that the same ad can have different effects depending upon the media context in which the ad appears. This experiment investigated how the semantic relation between the content of advertisements and editorial texts, and the ad location on newspaper pages affect attention and memory for advertisements. We recorded participants' eye movements while they read newspaper articles to rate how interesting the texts were. Recognition for ads, logos, and editorial headlines was measured on the following day. Results revealed a discrepancy between attention and memory results, suggesting that incongruency increased attention to ads, whereas congruency improved recognition of ads. In addition, ads presented on the right attracted more attention and were recognized better than ads on the left. The results have implications for pretesting of advertisements, because attention and memory for ads were associated with higher preference for brands, and purchase intention was enhanced for the brands that were recognized. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Congruency, saliency and gist in the inspection of objects in natural scenes

Cited by 42 publications

References 12 publications

The elephant in the room: Inconsistency in scene viewing and representation.

The elephant in the room: Inconsistency in scene viewing and representation.

Object–scene inconsistencies do not capture gaze: evidence from the flash-preview moving-window paradigm

Attention and Memory for Newspaper Advertisements: Effects of Ad–Editorial Congruency and Location

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