Cookies on this website

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you click 'Accept all cookies' we'll assume that you are happy to receive all cookies and you won't see this message again. If you click 'Reject all non-essential cookies' only necessary cookies providing core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility will be enabled. Click 'Find out more' for information on how to change your cookie settings.

The mind can track not only the changing locations of moving objects, but also their changing features, which are often meaningful for guiding action. How does the mind track such features? Using a task in which observers tracked the changing orientation of a rolling wheel's spoke, we found that this ability is enabled by a highly feature-specific process which continuously tracks the orientation feature itself--even during occlusion, when the feature is completely invisible. This suggests that the mental representation of a changing orientation feature and its moving object are continuously transformed and updated, akin to studies showing continuous tracking of an object's boundaries alone. We also found a systematic error in performance, whereby the orientation was reliably perceived to be further ahead than it truly was. This effect appears to occur because during occlusion the mental representation of the feature is transformed beyond the veridical position, perhaps in order to conservatively anticipate future feature states.

Original publication

DOI

10.1167/16.3.22

Type

Journal article

Journal

J Vis

Publication Date

2016

Volume

16

Keywords

Adult, Distance Perception, Female, Humans, Male, Motion Perception, Orientation, Pattern Recognition, Visual, Young Adult