Seven Myths on Crowding and Peripheral Vision

Strasburger, Hans

doi:10.1177/2041669520913052

Cited by 76 publications

(83 citation statements)

References 174 publications

(375 reference statements)

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“…Crowding distance increases linearly with eccentricity (Bouma, 1970;Kooi et al, 1994;Levi & Carney, 2009;Toet & Levi, 1992), and increases with target-flanker similarity (Andriessen & Bouma, 1976;Kooi et al, 1994;Leat et al, 1999;Nazir, 1992) as well as the number of distractors (Felisbert et al, 2005;Grainger et al, 2010). For review see (Herzog et al, 2015;Levi, 2008;Pelli & Tillman, 2008;Strasburger, 2020;Whitney & Levi, 2011). Among the normally sighted, crowding was initially reported in the periphery, and, after long debate, has now been convincingly demonstrated in the fovea (Coates et al, 2018;Flom, Heath, et al, 1963;Liu & Arditi, 2000;Malania et al, 2007;Pelli et al, 2016;Siderov et al, 2013;Toet & Levi, 1992).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Bouma law accounts for crowding in fifty observers

Kurzawski

Burchell

Thapa

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Crowding is the failure to recognize an object due to surrounding clutter. Its strength varies across the visual field and individuals. To characterize the statistics of crowding—ultimately to relate psychophysics of crowding to physiology—we measured radial crowding distance and acuity of 105 observers along the four cardinal meridians of the visual field. Fitting the well-known Bouma law — crowding distance depends linearly on radial eccentricity — explains 52% of the variance in log crowding distance, cross-validated. Our enhanced Bourma model, with factors for observer, meridian, and target kind, explains 72% of the variance, again cross-validated. The meridional factors confirm previously reported asymmetries. We find a 0.62 horizontal:vertical advantage, a 0.92 lower:upper advantage, and a 0.82 right:left advantage. Crowding distance and acuity have a correlation of 0.41 at the fovea, which drops to 0.23 at ±5 deg along the horizontal midline. Acuity and crowding represent the size and spacing limits of perception. Since they are dissociated in clinical populations (Song et al., 2014; Strappini et al., 2017) and shown here to be only moderately correlated in our sample of mostly university students, clinical testing to predict real-world performance should consider measuring both. In sum, enhancing the Bouma law with terms for meridian, observer, and target kind provides an excellent fit to our 105-person survey of crowding.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Bouma law accounts for crowding in fifty observers

Kurzawski

Burchell

Thapa

et al. 2021

Preprint

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“…This is impressively illustrated by models that produce spatially distorted images that cannot be distinguished from their original, undistorted images in the periphery (Balas, Nakano, & Rosenholtz, 2009;Freeman & Simoncelli, 2011;Koenderink, Valsecchi, van Doorn, Wagemans, & Gegenfurtner, 2017). Beyond these low-level effects, the peripheral visual field is also more heavily affected by crowding (Korte, 1923;Bouma, 1970; for reviews see Levi, 2008;Pelli, 2008;Pelli & Tillman, 2008;Whitney & Levi, 2011;Strasburger, 2020). Crowding occurs when the recognition of one object is impaired by the presence of other objects in the vicinity.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…Aubert & Foerster, 1857;Lettvin, 1976). This can be described as a more texture-like perception, where access to individual elements is limited, while summary statistics are still available (for reviews see Strasburger et al, 2011;Rosenholtz, 2016;Whitney & Yamanashi Leib, 2018;Strasburger, 2020).…”

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A review of interactions between peripheral and foveal vision

2020

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Visual processing varies dramatically across the visual field. These differences start in the retina and continue all the way to the visual cortex. Despite these differences in processing, the perceptual experience of humans is remarkably stable and continuous across the visual field. Research in the last decade has shown that processing in peripheral and foveal vision is not independent, but is more directly connected than previously thought. We address three core questions on how peripheral and foveal vision interact, and review recent findings on potentially related phenomena that could provide answers to these questions. First, how is the processing of peripheral and foveal signals related during fixation? Peripheral signals seem to be processed in foveal retinotopic areas to facilitate peripheral object recognition, and foveal information seems to be extrapolated toward the periphery to generate a homogeneous representation of the environment. Second, how are peripheral and foveal signals re-calibrated? Transsaccadic changes in object features lead to a reduction in the discrepancy between peripheral and foveal appearance. Third, how is peripheral and foveal information stitched together across saccades? Peripheral and foveal signals are integrated across saccadic eye movements to average percepts and to reduce uncertainty. Together, these findings illustrate that peripheral and foveal processing are closely connected, mastering the compromise between a large peripheral visual field and high resolution at the fovea. Brief overview of differences between peripheral and foveal vision Although the human eye is often compared to a photographic camera, processing across the visual field is not homogeneous like in a camera film or a digital sensor. First, there are gaps in sensory information due to several anatomical properties of the eye: (a) there are no photoreceptors in the optic disc, where the axons of the retinal ganglion cells exit the eyeball: this leads to a blind spot (Mariotte, 1740, cited after Ferree & Rand, 1912; Grzybowski & Aydin, 2007). (b) The center of the retina contains only cone, but no rod photoreceptors (Schultze, 1866; Oesterberg, 1935; Curcio, Sloan, Kalina, & Hendrickson, 1990), leading to a central scotoma under dark illumination conditions. (c) Because photoreceptors are located on the back side of the retina, away from the light, blood vessels cast shadows on them (Purkinje, 1819; von Helmholtz, 1867; Evans, 1927; Adams & Horton, 2002). The second striking difference to a photographic camera is that the processing of visual signals varies quite dramatically across the visual field. Here, an important distinction arises between the center of the visual field, called the fovea, and the rest, called the periphery. 1 We only briefly highlight some of the key differences in processing and perception between the fovea and the periphery because these have been reviewed in detail elsewhere

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“…In crowding, perception of a target strongly deteriorates when embedded in context (review: Herzog, Thunell, & Ögmen, 2016 ; Levi, 2008 ; Pelli & Tillman, 2008 ; Strasburger, 2020 ). Crowding is the standard situation in everyday vision because elements are rarely encountered in isolation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dissecting (un)crowding

et al. 2021

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In crowding, perception of a target deteriorates in the presence of nearby flankers. Surprisingly, perception can be rescued from crowding if additional flankers are added (uncrowding). Uncrowding is a major challenge for all classic models of crowding and vision in general, because the global configuration of the entire stimulus is crucial. However, it is unclear which characteristics of the configuration impact (un)crowding. Here, we systematically dissected flanker configurations and showed that (un)crowding cannot be easily explained by the effects of the sub-parts or low-level features of the stimulus configuration. Our modeling results suggest that (un)crowding requires global processing. These results are well in line with previous studies showing the importance of global aspects in crowding.

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Seven Myths on Crowding and Peripheral Vision

Cited by 76 publications

References 174 publications

The Bouma law accounts for crowding in fifty observers

The Bouma law accounts for crowding in fifty observers

A review of interactions between peripheral and foveal vision

Dissecting (un)crowding

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