Psychophysics

Knocking a longstanding theory of distance perception

Once upon a time, Kepler and Descartes proposed that vergence is the critical absolute distance cue. And that theory lived happily ever after. Until Paul Linton‘s paper. In this podcast, I interview Paul (pictured below) about his work published in the Psychonomic Society journal Attention, Perception & Psychophysics.  Learn about longstanding theories and Linton’s research […]

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Facilitating your fovea’s focus by crowding your periphery: Visual crowding in 3-D

We owe most of our visual acuity to the fovea, the central area of the retina that is most densely packed with receptors—around 150,000 cones per square millimetre. Whenever we focus on an object, we move our eyes so ensure that the image is projected onto the fovea. And we see whatever is there, irrespective of […]

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Hungry Eyes See More Cookies: Food Deprivation and Perceptual Discrimination

Are you hungry, yet? How long has it been since you have eaten? Are you cranky and tired? I am as I write this piece.  I went on an unexpected food deprivation plan, thanks to a recent trip to Central America. I can’t wait to eat more than toast, applesauce, and bananas again. Food deprivation […]

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Muslims, Gays, and Vowels: Psychophysics Explains Biases in Demographic Estimates

What percentage of Americans are Muslim? What percentage of Americans are LGBT individuals? What percentage of Americans are Christian? Think about it and take real guesses. If you are like the average person, your guesses were likely overestimates of the real numbers for the smaller percentages (for Muslims; for LGBT), and underestimates for the larger […]

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