The asymmetry of lateral interference in visual letter identification

Banks, William P.; Bachrach, Kenneth M.; Larson, Douglas W.

doi:10.3758/bf03199684

Cited by 54 publications

(62 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…This effect, known as lateral interference, has several well-documented properties: (1) One interesting property is that the interference is strongly asymmetric. The theoretical nature of the asymmetry is in dispute (see Banks, Bachrach, & Larson, 1977), but empirically the effect is quite clear. A targeted letter is less likely to be identified if another letter or noise item is placed on the peripheral side of the target letter than if the same noise item is placed on the foveal side of the target letter (Banks et al, 1977;Bouma, 1973;Shaw, 1969;Wolford & Hollingsworth, 1974b;among others).…”

Section: Lateral Interferencementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The theoretical nature of the asymmetry is in dispute (see Banks, Bachrach, & Larson, 1977), but empirically the effect is quite clear. A targeted letter is less likely to be identified if another letter or noise item is placed on the peripheral side of the target letter than if the same noise item is placed on the foveal side of the target letter (Banks et al, 1977;Bouma, 1973;Shaw, 1969;Wolford & Hollingsworth, 1974b;among others). It should be noted that a noise item on the foveal side of a letter does provide some interference and that placing noise items on both sides of the target causes more of a, performance decrement than a single item on either side (Wolford, 1975).…”

Section: Lateral Interferencementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some of the overall organization of a display is probably being detected and probably at a very early stage. Banks, Bachrach, and Larson (1977) argued that many existing lateral interference effects could be explained on the basis of the retinal placement of target and noise. Such an argument should not apply to the current research, since all of the display types have similar spatial characteristics.…”

Section: Alternative Theoretical Approachesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Two main points characterize the picture. The first is that accuracy decreases and latency increases as the stimulus is moved from the center of the fovea to the periphery (Banks, Bachrach, & Larson, 1977;Eriksen & Schultz, 1977;Shaw, 1977;Wolford & Hollingsworth, 1974a). The second main point is that the retinal gradient (i.e., the performance gradient associated with a letter's retinal location) is far steeper if the stimulus in question is surrounded by other items than if it appears singly (Mackworth, 1965;Wolford, 1975, Figure 2).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Evidence for feature perturbations

Wolford

Shum

1980

Perception & Psychophysics

109

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Feature perturbations were proposed by Wolford (1975) to explain the pattern of errors generated by subjects in experiments involving speeded presentations. These experiments were carried out to test the notion of feature perturbations in a fairly direct fashion. The logic of the experiments involved the creation of an artificial alphabet in which feature perturbations, if they occurred, would lead to predictable error patterns. The results of the three experiments supported the notion of feature perturbations. Evidence was also found for errors which resulted from items that were correctly identified but that were reported in an incorrect order. These latter errors were shown to be distinct from errors resulting from feature perturbations.Over the years, there have been many experiments on visual information processing, most of them using some form of speeded presentation. One consistent feature of a wide variety of such experiments is that subjects make substantial numbers of errors. The high error rates were of some surprise to early investigators, many of whom thought they were examining aspects of the reading process. During reading, skilled readers presumably make relatively few errors. It seems plausible that if we can determine why subjects make errors in our experiments, we will have a better understanding of how visual information is processed.

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Section: Lateral Interferencementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Lateral Interferencementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Alternative Theoretical Approachesmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Evidence for feature perturbations

Wolford

Shum

1980

Perception & Psychophysics

109

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“…Since results in Experiment 8 were the same as in Experiments 1 and 2, the effect cannot be explained with reference to an interaction between confusability and acuity. The implications of the findings for various models of visual information processing are discussed.A number of studies have compared the effect of placing a nontarget on the peripheral side of a parafoveally projected target with placing it on the central (foveal) side (Banks, Bachrach, & Larson, 1977;Banks, Larson, & Prinzmetal, 1979;Chastain, 1981;Chastain & Lawson, 1979;Krumhansl, 1977;Krumhansl & Thomas, 1977;White, 1981). The inclusion of target-nontarget confusability as a variable in these studies has been occasional and largely incidental, with inconclusive results.…”

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confidence: 99%

Confusability and interference between members of parafoveal letter pairs

Chastain

1982

Perception & Psychophysics

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In each of three experiments, confusability between members of a parafoveally exposed pair of letters affected accuracy of identifying the peripheral, but not the central, letter. Confusability was determined from a confusion matrix developed for each subject. In Experiment I, only one letter in each pair was identified on each exposure, and the position of pair members was varied over trials while the absolute position of the pair was held at a constant distance from fixation. In Experiment 2, both letters were identified on each exposure. In Experiment 3, the criterion letter was presented at a constant distance from fixation, and both letters were identified on each exposure. Since results in Experiment 8 were the same as in Experiments 1 and 2, the effect cannot be explained with reference to an interaction between confusability and acuity. The implications of the findings for various models of visual information processing are discussed.A number of studies have compared the effect of placing a nontarget on the peripheral side of a parafoveally projected target with placing it on the central (foveal) side (Banks, Bachrach, & Larson, 1977;Banks, Larson, & Prinzmetal, 1979;Chastain, 1981;Chastain & Lawson, 1979;Krumhansl, 1977;Krumhansl & Thomas, 1977;White, 1981). The inclusion of target-nontarget confusability as a variable in these studies has been occasional and largely incidental, with inconclusive results. White (1981) varied the similarity of adjacent borders of parafoveally presented geometric forms. Although performance was poorer when adjacent contours were similar, the magnitude of the effect was not significantly different for central peripheral targets. However, it is difficult to directly relate this finding to the effects of stimulus confusability and target position on performance. Only similarity between adjacent borders, and not confusability between stimuli, was varied. It would also be inappropriate to draw conclusions from the absence of a significant effect. Krumhansl and Thomas (1977) used three sets of letters as stimuli. Inter-and intraset confusability was not examined for those particular letters, but instead was derived from Townsend's (1971) alphabetic confusion matrix. Although some tendency was noted for the difference between performance with confusable and performance with nonconfusable stimuli to be smaller when the nontarget was peripheral than when it was central, the effect was not statistically significant. Krumhansl (1977), using those same sets of letters,The author would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on an earlier version of this article. Requests for reprints should be addressed to Garvin Chastain, Department of Psychology, Boise State University, Boise, Idaho 83725.found a similar effect. She also found that the difference between the effects of placing the nontarget on the target's foveal side and on its peripheral side was greater with nonconfusable stimuli. Krurnhansl (1977) attributed this result to the mislocalization of featur...

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