Perception

Introduction:
Perception is an immediate comprehension of an object or situation affecting any or all the
sense organs by way of sensation. Perception means our knowledge of objects. We sense
not only the objects but name them too. Sense organs when stimulated by the various
changes within or outside an organism, send a barrage of nerve impulses to the various
parts of our brain. And it is only when the patterns of the sensory data (sensory input) are
processed by our brain that we come to know what our senses are perceiving. Hence, the
process of assigning meaning to a 'raw sense data' is as important as the sensory data itself.

Meaning:
In the absence of any processing by the brain, we would never know' what is 'outside' and
'inside' an organism. Perception is the general name given to the interpretation of sensory
data by the brain. So perception is a process by which sensory input is so interpreted as to
make it meaningful. Since understanding and meaning are involved in perception, it is
apparent that past experiences play a great role. Perception is thought to be bi-polar
process-one aspect is characteristics of stimuli while the other involves characteristics of
perceiver himself, his past experiences, motives and attitudes.

Definitions:
Woodworth Considers that "In perception the chain of events is stimulus, response of the
sense organ, sensory nerves, first cortical response which is perception."

Boring (1942) "The distinction between sensation and perception is commonly made on the
assumption that sensation refers to the action by a receptor when it is stimulated and
perception refers to the meaning given to sensation."

Eysenck (1972) "Perception is a psychological function which enables the organism to

receive and process information".

Mohsin. "The simplest act of perception involves the setting of the stimulus field into figure
and background relationship".

In the light of above definitions perception can best be defined as a concrete, complex,
cognitive, active, secondary, second cortical response, presentative and representative,
psychological, purposeful or meaningful; definite process aroused by the stimulation of a
sense organ. It gives us knowledge of things or objects present in the external world which
can be analysed into a sensation and ideas simultaneously associated with these
sensations.

Process of Perception
According to Munn (1954), the term 'perception' is customarily used to refer to relatively
complex receptor and neural processes which underlie our awareness of ourselves and our
world. Whether we look at perceiving from a stand-point of behaviour, experience, or the
response mechanisms involved, is an extremely complex process. Receptor functions play a
necessary and a predominant role, but other functions may also be involved.

1. Receptor process. The first process in perception is the receptor process Different
perceptions like visual, olfactory, auditory, tactual or cutaneous are activated simultaneously
but perception is limited only to a particular receptor process. We not only see objects, but
we hear, and perhaps even smell them at the same time. The rose, by virtue of its presence,
stimulates three different receptor cells thus activating three different receptor processes.

2. Unification process. This is the second step in the main process. For a perception of
rose, a unification of the different sensations is necessary. Even if the flower were to be seen
or rather experienced by the eye, a unification of all the sensations from the different parts of
the flower is a must.

3. Symbolic process. This process is the next, the third process in perception. Sensory
stimulation arouses certain neural activities which have their trace in the nervous system,
these are popularly known as neural traces. These traces act as symbols or substitute for
original stimulus or experience. These are called images. These symbolic images help us
while perceiving something. For any perception present sensation and the past experience
in the form of images are necessary. This process helps in adding meaning and knowledge
to the interpretation of sensory experience. Most things have sentiments attached to them. A
rose reminds us of the friend who created in us the interest for it. The flower symbolises the
friend.

4. Affective process. Perceptual experience may have its affective aspect, when we are
perceiving an object along with receptor and symbolic process. Affective process is also
involved to complete perception, in fact it forms an integral part of the process of perception.
A flower may arouse a happy feeling of a friend who has presented it and strong electric
current may arouse feelings of unpleasantness.

Nature of Perception/Characteristics of Perception

There are many facts about perception which are so simple that they almost escape notice.
We will discuss a few facts about the nature of perception which are general and apply to all
cases of perception.

1. Perception is response to some change or difference in the environment. If the world

were perfectly homogeneous and we were in equilibrium with it, we would experience
nothing. Let some conditions change suddenly, or one receptor be stimulated and another
not, and we sense the fact at once.

2. Perception is selective. A second general characteristic of perception is that it is

selective. At any given moment hundreds of stimuli are reaching our sense organs.
Organism has to select the particular stimulus and it will attend the one to which it will
respond in some unified, coherent way. Simplicity or singleness of response, is part of the
basic biological nature of living matter.

3. Perception is an active process. Perception uses both sensory data from present
stimulation and the learning gained from past experience. Far from being just a mirror
whereby we become aware of what is "out there". Sensory cues and past experiences are
organised to give us the most structured, and meaningful pictures of the world.

4. Perception fills the missing details. Perception not only structures and interprets
incoming stimulation but often fills in missing details, when you look at a sofa, for example,
you cannot see all sides of it and perhaps cannot even see one of the legs, yet you "see" the
sofa as being solid and whole, and you recognize it the sofa you saw yesterday even though
the exact pattern of stimulation on the return may be quite different. This process of filling in
is so common and accepted that we are amused by the anecdote of the sceptic who, when
asked the colour of a certain cow, said, "It is brown on this side"

5. Perception is organised. The eyes and the brain are able to group or to organise a
number of stimuli into a larger unit to which the organism now may respond in a simple
fashion. This unifying activity of perception makes it possible for persons to respond to a far
more complicated environment than he could without it. What one perceives, is perceived as
a whole in an organised pattern and not as the sum total of various parts.

6. Perception is preparation for response. Perception is the first step towards the active
behaviour of an organism. It is the preparatory stage that prepares an individual for action
and response. Our sensory receptors are just the receiving and transmitting centres of the
sensory information. How we should react and respond is ordered by our central nervous
system through the involvement of some mediating activity known as perception.

7. Perception is a personal thing. Perception is very personal. It enables the individual to

know where he stands in relation to the objects, conditions, and people in his environment
and to act accordingly. Even the relationships between one object and another are
established in reference to oneself. Terms such as right, left, above and below, for example,
are obviously based on the individual's own position as a point of reference.

8. Perception involves Sensation. In a simple and straightforward way, we may sense that
sensation precedes perception. The relationships between sensation and perception is
always direct, that is, what we do have in sensation is always a part of perception.
Perception goes beyond sensation as it organises, interprets and gives meaning to the result
of sensations. Therefore, to a student of Psychology, perception means assigning meaning
to sensory stimuli. Sensation, attached with some meaning is thus termed as perception.

9. Perception has three main functions. Firstly, Perception tells you where an object is in
relation to yourself i.e. (Location). Secondly, it tells you whether the object is moving and in
what direction. Finally, it tells you what the object is (form) Our reaction to any situation is
determined by the way we perceive it. The same objective situation may be perceived in two
quite different ways by two different people or even by the same person at two different
times. On your "good days", for example, college and everything about it may seem very
satisfying, but on "blue Monday" your classes may seem dull, your food tasteless, and your
friends irritating. Usually we are unaware of the extent to which our assumptions and
expectations determine what we want. Instead, perception carries the conviction that what
we see is a true and direct representation of reality. Hence the old saying, "Seeing is
believing." An illusion, or false perception, seems false only when we compare it with what
we know to be true.

Factors influencing perception

1. Motives. Motives tend to influence perception in the direction of stimuli related to the
motives involved. Atkinson (1949) studied the effect of hunger or perception of vague
drawings which were perceived as food objects by hungry subjects. A study by Gilchrist and
Nesberb (1952) asked people to rate pictures for brightness, and found that the longer they
had gone without food, the brighter the food pictures were rated, although the research
participants' ratings of other pictures showed no change. These studies, and others of the
same kind, implied that internal motivational states, in this case hunger, could directly affect
perception.

2. Emotion. Reporting another study showing effects of emotion on perception, Solley and
Haigh (1958) described how children were asked to draw pictures of Santa Claus in the
month leading up to Christmas and the month afterwards. The children's representations
became larger and included more presents as Christmas approached, but shrank and
included less details after the season. This study implied that complex emotional states,
such as anticipation and excitement, could also influence perceptual processes

3. Attitudes. In an experiment, Sherif and Sherif (1956) showed that Perception was greatly
influenced by both intra- and inter-group attitudes. Allport (1954) described a study which
showed how prejudice could affect perception. The experimenters used a stereoscope,
which is a device for presenting a separate picture to each eye at the same time. They
showed their research participants mixed-race pairs of individuals, with one member of each
pair shown to each eye. In general, people were most definite when they were picking out
members of their own race, and more unsure when they were categorising people from other
ethnic groups. But Afrikaaners, who were noted for their racial prejudices, differentiated far
more sharply between the races.

4. Personality and Personal Adjustment. According to Bartley (1958) "Personality features

of an individual predispose him to apprehend objects and situations relevant to these
features." The fact that personality characteristics tend to play maximal role in the perception
of ambiguous stimuli has been utilised widely by psychologists in their study of personality.
For example, in the Inkblot test by Rorschach where a person is asked to tell what an ink
blot resembles. His answers about perception of ink blot are affected by his personality.

6. Values and Perceptual defence. In 1948, Postman, Bruner and McGinnies showed that
sexual or other taboo wards have higher recognition thresholds than ordinary words do.
When the research participants were shown those words very quickly, they needed more
microseconds to identify the taboo words than they did to identify the neutral ones. The
researchers used a device known as a tachistoscope, which presents stimuli for very brief,
but measurable, periods of time.
Postman et al. argued that their findings were evidence for perceptual defence-the idea that
our perceptual system tries to protect us against threatening or disturbing stimulus, by
making them more difficult to identify. But Bitterman and Kniffin (1953) found that the time
difference in recognition disappeared if people were allowed to write down their responses
instead of saying them loudly. They argued from this that the higher perceptual threshold
was not really perceptual defence, but was simply a response hint. The research participants
were simply unwilling to say rude words aloud.

6. Culture. Cultural variables are inevitable consequences of human perception. Bruner and
Goodman have pointed out that cultural groups may differ from one another in their
perceptual behaviour because of the fundamental differences in their way of perceiving
social situations. Social anthropologists tend to show that the same fact is perceived
differently by people of different cultures because of the differences in existing frames of
reference.

7. Familiarity. Familiarity or past experience plays a significant role in the organisation of

perception. If the pattern appears to be familiar, such as the figure of an animal, tree or
human being, it will be very easily organised to form one unit. If a person, for instance, has
seen a telephone earlier, he can observe it as a telephone at once from a mass of other
stimuli which have no meaning for him.

8. Perceptual Set. We are continually being bombarded with information from the world
around us, which we have to make sense somehow. We need to select and pay attention to
what is relevant to us at any given moment. One way to achieve this is by 'focussing' our
perception, so that we are more ready to perceive certain things than others. Cognitive
processes can be put into a kind of state of readiness, which psychologists refer to as SET.
The word 'Set' in this context is used in the same way as at the start of a race, where
athletes are told 'get ready', get set; GO! It means to be fully prepared and anticipate what is
coming so that we can act on it as effectively as possible. When we speak of readiness to
perceive the environment in a particular way it is termed as the Perceptual set. According to
Bootzin 1991, "Perceptual set is a readiness to interpret stimuli in a specific way on the basis
of expectations, experience or psychological state." It enables us to respond quickly and
appropriately to stimuli that are related to our current concerns.

9. Motivation. Motivational state can also have a strong impact on how we perceive our
environments, presumably by the mechanism of establishing perceptual sets. For example, if
you drive down a main thoroughfare while feeling hunger pangs you probably notice almost
every sign of food advertisements. Sandford (1936) deprived research participants of food
for various lengths of time up to four hours, and then showed them ambiguous pictures.
Saadford found that the longer the participants had been food-deprived, the more likely they
were to interpret the pictures as being something to do with food.

10. Selective Perception. Another form of perceptual set is the tendency to perceive stimuli
that are consistent with our expectations or beliefs, and to ignore those that are inconsistent.
For example, if you believe that all neatly dressed elderly women are honest, you might not
even think twice about the elderly woman at the next table when your purse disappears in a
restaurant, even if she is the most obvious suspect.
Gestalt factors of perception

According to Gestalt psychologists, there is organisation in perception. Stimuli have form,

meaning and pattern and so they get organised in perception. Gestalt means ‘form or
configuration’. Gestalt psychologists are also called ‘holists’ because of their emphasis on
the ‘whole person' or the ‘whole situation’. Perception is organised with the help of the
processes.

1. Synthesis. All sensations are unified and taken in a whole unit.

2. Analysis. Larger whole and smaller units are differentiated.

Gestalt psychologists identified a set of principles of Perception, which they referred to as

the "Laws of Pragnanz". Pragnanz has the same linguistic origin as our world 'Pregnant', and
it means "Loaded with meaning."

1. Law of Similarity. According to this principle, if we look at a set of stimuli, and if none of
the other gestalt laws apply, then we will automatically group similar ones. You may describe
the figure of similarity in terms of rows or a grid.

2. Law of Proximity or Contiguity. According to this principle, stimuli which are close to
each other will be seen as forming a group, even if they are not particularly similar. If we see
the figure and try to verbally describe the figure we will say three sets of lines because of
proximity. So if articles of the same size, colour and elements are closely together, they will
be perceived as a unit.

3. Law of Continuity. See the figure naming continuity. Is it a circle with two lines stemming
from it, or is it a (broken) line that goes through a circle? If you saw it as a single (broken)
line, you were probably organising your perceptions according to the rule of continuity. That
is, we perceive a series of points or a broken line as having unity.

4. Law of closure. is the strongest Gestalt Principle of Perception. It has a strong tendency
to prefer closed figures rather than fragmented or unconnected lines. Figure of Closure
explains how the arcs tend to be perceived as a circle (or circle with gaps rather than series
of arcs). Law of closure makes our perceived world of form more complete than the sensory
stimulation of what is perceived.

5. Law of Symmetry. Principle of good gestalt or Good form -Law of symmetry states that
there is a tendency to organise things to make a balanced figure or symmetrical figure that
includes all parts. This affects our perception, in the form of a preference for figures which
appear to be well rounded or symmetrical, rather than ones that seem fragmented or messy.
People identify figures with good 'gestalt' much more quickly than more complex or less
structured forms.

6. Law of Common fate. Elements that seem to move together are perceived as belonging
together. A group of people running in the same direction appear unified in purpose. Birds
that flock together seem to be a feather.

Perception of form.
We know how far away the object is, we know that it is moving towards us. But how does the
brain interpret this moving source of stimulation as a dog not as a human or a horse? We
perceive form with the help of either by feature analysis i.e. perceiving form by analysing a
scene into its parts or by immediately interpreting entire organised patterns (Gestalt View).

1. Feature Analysis. If form perception involves breaking down a pattern into its parts, what
are the parts? Because the visual system responds selectively to contrast, width, edges,
angles and their motions, therefore the proposal that we perceive form by analysing an
object into such features seems to make sense. According to feature analysis we perceive a
form on the basis of a relatively small collection of features, which can be combined, rotated
and expanded to form the objects that we see in the world. For example, to perceive an
alphabet, the brain notes the distinctive features, compares them with the features stored in
memory and places the alphabet in the appropriate category the "feature list" that provides
the best match with the stimulus.

2. The Gestalt view of Form Perception. The Gestalt psychologists, led by Max
Wertheimer, Kurt Koffka and Wolfgang Kohlar, had a very different view of form perception.
They maintained that we first take a unified whole, the "global picture", or gestalt, and then
understand the parts. The context gives the individual elements their meaning. Because we
tend to absorb meaning through context and in whole chunks- a sentence, paragraph, a
painting, or figure against-its background, we can fill in missing information. We can also
compensate for or overlook mistakes. In the gestalt view, our perception of form is controlled
by the brain's organising principles. There are organising tendencies within an individual
himself which act on sensory data to produce the world of experience. These tendencies are
termed as Principles or Laws of organisation. There are four laws of organisation.
1. Law of figure and background
2. Law of grouping
3. Law of Contour
4. Law of closure

1. Figure and Background. If you look out from your window, you may see people,
buildings, cars, and streets, or perhaps grass, trees, birds and clouds. All these objects tend
to be perceived as figures against backgrounds. Cars against the background of the street
are easier to pick out than other static objects. Birds against the sky are more likely to be
perceived than, as the saying goes, birds in the bush. The capacity to discriminate between
figures from backgrounds is most primitive. One of the brain's organising tendencies make
figures stand out from their setting. This organisational principle is called the figure ground
distinction. The figure stands out from the ground like a word on a page; it seems to be more
solid and well defined, and it seems to lie in front of a uniform background. Figure has
certain characteristics which are usually not to be found in the background.

Figure Background

Shape is clear and distinct. Shape is vague, formless.

It appears on the front. It appears behind the figure.

It is bright. It is dull.

It is meaningful. It is meaningless.

Figure is of small size. Background is of large size.

When figure background relationships are ambiguous, or capable of being interpreted in

various ways, our perceptions tend to be unstable, to shift back and forth. Look at the Escher
Print. How many objects, animals and people can you find? If your eye is drawn back and
forth, so that sometimes you are perceiving light figures on a dark background and then dark
figures on a light background, you are experiencing figure-background reversals. Here in this
figure, background is meaningful as the figure is used by psychologists to demonstrate
figure-background perception. There are no cues that suggest which area must be the
figure. For this reason, our perception may shift from seeing the vase as the figure and then
seeing two profiles as the figure.

Escher print.

The Necker cube. provides another example of how an ambiguous drawing can lead to
perceptual shifts. Hold this page at arm's length and stare at the centre of the figure for 30
seconds or so. Try to allow your eye muscles to relax. (The feeling is of your eyes "glazing
over.") After a while you will notice a dramatic shift in your perception of these "stacked
boxes", so that what was once a front edge is now a back edge, and vice versa. Again, the
dramatic perceptual shift is made possible by the fact that the outline of the drawing permits
two interpretations.

Depth Perception.
Once an object catches our attention, we rely on depth perception to determine how far
away it is. We primarily depend on our distance senses which serve as a radar of a ship at
sea. It is an answer to a question. WHERE IS IT? LOCATION. With the help of depth
perception we can determine either absolute or relative distance.

1. Absolute distance refers to the distance between you and the object. e.g. how far you
are from building across the road.
2. Relative Distance refers to the distance between two objects or between the parts of the
same object. We seem to be much better at determining relative distance than we are at
judging absolute distance (Sekuler and Blake, 1985) Depth Perception is the ability to view
the world in three dimensions and to perceive distance. The images that are projected on the
retina are flat and two dimensional. Yet the world around us is three dimensional, and we
perceive it that way. How do we translate from 2-D to 3-D ? Perception of depth is achieved
in parts when different sets of information are received by the eyes regarding an object in the
environment and because of some fine mechanism in our eyes. Psychologists call them the
cues of depth perception. These cues help us to perceive the world in 3-D.

MONOCULAR CUES OF DEPTH PERCEPTION.

These are signals that allow us to perceive distance and depth with just one eye. According
to Burnham, (1983) it is not necessary to use two eyes to perceive depth; certain cues
permit us to obtain a sense of depth and distance with just one eye. Most artists and painters
are aware of such cues and often make use of them to produce 3-D effects in their paintings.
Some of the monocular cues are as under.

1. Size of image. The retinal image is larger for nearby objects than for distant objects. If the
distance is sufficiently great, so that size constancy is not involved, we perceive the object
as smaller, hence as more distant, when its retinal image is smaller. But we must be
acquainted with the actual size of the object. A certain kind of bird is of a fairly constant size,
hence when the image is small, we judge the bird to be at a greater distance than when the
image is large. In the case of unfamiliar objects, however, the size of the retinal image is of
little or no help. Take clouds for example, these could be of almost any size. What we see
might be a large cloud far up or a small cloud near the earth.

2. Interposition: An interposition is an obstruction of the view of an object by another object.

In such circumstances, the object that obstructs the view is nearer to the observer than the
one whose view is obstructed. This is a rather obvious distance cue. The object represented
in the retinal image as partially obscuring our view of another object is of course judged to be
closer. The essential cue is related to the contour lines of the overlapping objects. The object
whose contour is continuous at the point of overlapping is seen as closer; the object whose
contour is lost at the point of overlapping is seen as more distant.

3. Linear perspective. The decrease in the size and separation of objects as they become
more distant is often used by artists to represent distance. Lines converging as the horizon is
approached give the impression of increasing distance. Trees, telephone poles, and other
objects are decreased in size as they recede into the distance. The upper part of the picture
always represents the horizon; the lower part the ground, or floor, nearby.
4. Aerial perspective. When we do not know the actual distance of objects, an important
cue is provided by the clearness of perceived detail. A mountain, a building, or any other
object which stands out from its surroundings, seems closer on a clear day than on a smoky
or foggy one. In fact any familiar object seems closer when we can make out its details. So
in judging the distance of an object from us, we are influenced by the clearness of the
previous detail.

5. Texture. Gibson (1950) emphasised the importance of texture in depth perception. When
we look at a landscape, we see that the texture of the ground appears finer or denser as
distance increases. Objects located on coarser ground appear closer while those on a
ground of finer texture appear farther away.

6. Motion Parallax. The change in position of the image of an object on the retina as the
head moves, providing monocular cue to distance. The relative movement of the objects is
sometimes important in judging distance. Other things being equal the object which seems
to move rapidly is judged to be closer by us than that which moves by slowly. If we ourselves
are moving, objects nearby seem to go past in the opposite direction to that we are
travelling, but distant objects appear to move with us. There is evidence that individuals with
only one eye depend upon clues derived from head and eye movements as well as
movements in the environment. When you are stationary, the effect can be created by the
motion of objects in the environment. For example, if you look at leaves on a tree with one
eye closed, they form a confusing array. But when they flutter in the breeze, groups of leaves
stand out and depth becomes apparent (sekuler and Blake, 1985)

7. Shadows. Another indication of depth and relief, much used by the painter, is the shading
on a rounded or angular surface. Also the shadow cast by one object upon another shows
which object is farther away, provided that the source or direction of light is clearly revealed.

BINOCULAR CUES OF DEPTH PERCEPTION

1.Retinal disparity: Retinal disparity is the difference in images falling on the retinas of the
two eyes. Images are more dissimilar when the object is closer than when it is at a farther
distance. The closer the object, the greater the retinal disparity. The correspondence
between distance and the amount of disparity is the reason retinal disparity can be used as
depth cues. Double images occur when the rays from an object fall on non- corresponding
areas of the two retinas. With both eyes converging upon an object, its image falls on the
two foveas which are corresponding areas. Other objects may be seen as single because
they are at the same distance as the convergence point and so are imaged on
corresponding areas. But objects nearer or farther than the convergence point are imaged
on non-corresponding or separate areas of the two retinas and are said to show disparity.
The amount of disparity is a measurable quantity of it. The closer the object, the greater the
retinal disparity. The correspondence between the distance and the amount of disparity is
the reason and retinal disparity can be used as a depth cue. When we look at a particular
object, the two eyes do not receive exactly the same image. Moreover, the images are more
dissimilar when the object is very close, than when it is far at the distance.

2. Convergence. Normally eyes converge upon a given object i.e., the two lines of regard
cross at the point of fixation. If an object on the horizon is viewed then lines of regard are
parallel i.e. there is no convergence. Eyes also converge more than when we fixate on
nearby objects, then we fixate on those that are at a distance. The eyes turn inward or
converge when we look at nearby objects. As we fixate objects farther away, the lines of
vision of eyes tend to be almost parallel For objects farther away than ten feet, the lines of
sight of the eyes are essentially parallel. For nearer objects, however, the eyes turn more
and more toward each other, that is they converge If such convergence aids in depth
perception, the cue is probably kinesthetic impulses from sense organs in the muscles which
make the eyes converge.

These reactions are controlled by muscles attached to the eyeball, hence nerve impulses
generated in the course of this adjustment might serve as distance cues. The same turning
movements are made when a person has only one eye. But convergence is of doubtful value
as a spatial cue unless the objects fixated are fairly close.

3. Accommodation. Accommodation is the adjustment of the shape of the lens of the eye in
order to bring an image into focus on the retina. This adjustment is made by the ciliary
muscles, which are attached to the lens and allow it to bulge when they contract, thus
accommodating near objects. The lens of the eye changes its curvature as we fixate on
nearby and far-away objects. It becomes flat when focussing on distant objects and
assumes a convex shape when focussing on near objects. We are, of course, absolutely
unaware of these changes in the curvature of the lens, which are called accommodation.
They are brought about by the muscles and ligaments attached to the lens. Many
psychologists feel that the movements of these delicate muscles set up nerve impulses
which are used by the brain as cues of distance.

Summation Effect. In general, various cues of depth perception we have mentioned above
rarely work singly to produce the effects of depth. In point of fact, depth perception is the
summated effect of all these cues feeding their information to the brain. Even in every-day
life, there are situations when all the cues of depth are not available. Photographs, for
instance, provide us with almost all the monocular cues of depth; yet we cannot see real
depth in them because binocular cues tell us that photographs are flat and cannot have
depth. But if we look at the photograph through a paper tunnel (rolled paper), we shall notice
that the same photograph now shows better depth. This is because the conflicting binocular
cue (that the photograph is flat) is eliminated. Another conflicting binocular cue in such
circumstances is often the frame of the photograph. Real scenes do not have frames.
(Ghorpade, 1971).

PERCEPTUAL CONSTANCIES
It is a phenomenon by which physical objects are perceived as unvarying despite changes
in their appearance in the physical environment. For example, when your friend walks away
from you as you watch her walk away, the image on your retina becomes smaller and
smaller and you wonder 'Why is she shrinking? But despite the real change in the size of the
retinal image and the distance you still perceive her as of the same size. Similarly, as a
plane approaches, flies over head, and disappears yet you do not perceive the plane as
changing shape. Instead, you perceive it as unchanging despite the physical variations that
occur. We experience and explain perceptual constancies with the help of two theories:

1. Constructive Theory. This theory suggests that prior experience and expectations about
the size of an object are used to make inferences about its location (Rock, 1983) because
we have learned the size of a particular stimulus from earlier experience, and we
compensate for changes in its size on retina by inferring its location.

2. Ecological theory. This theory suggests that the relationship between objects in a scene
gives clues about the object's size. This view was given by Gibson whe suggested that all
the information we need to determine distance can be found in the image in our retina.
Neither constructive nor ecological theory provides an explanation of all instances of
perceptual constancies, and it is possible that constructive and ecological processes work in
combination (Bruce and Green 1990).

Size Constancy. Size constancy refers to that type of perceptual constancy where the
objects tend to retain their familiar size, irrespective of the viewing distance Even though
retinal image of objects exhibits some relationship between the size of retinal image and the
distance of the object from the observer, we usually find that the perceived sizes do not
perfectly correspond with the retinal image. If an object casts an image of 2 millimetres from
a distance of 5 feet, the same image will shrink to one millimetre if that object is moved to a
distance of ten feet. This is based on the law of visual angle. Size constancy is easily
demonstrated, look at some familiar object, say a coin, a pencil or a book. Hold it close to
your eyes. Does the object look smaller as you move it away and larger as you move it
closer. The chances are that it does not. It will look smaller only when it is moved much
farther away than the length of your arm.

2. Shape Constancy. Shape constancy refers to the tendency of perceiving the shape of
familiar objects as relatively stable, constant and unchanging despite the fact that the retinal
images may vary greatly depending on the viewing angle. We see the top of a glass bottle
as 'circular' whether we view it from the side or from the top. This is because of the reasons:
one is that experience has taught you that the cup will look circular when seen from above.
The second is that you may have labelled the cup circular or round. Experience and labels
make the world a stable place. In another example, a door is a rectangle only when viewed
straight on when we move to the side or open it, the left or right edge, comes closer and
appears to be larger, changing the retinal image to a trapezoid. Yet we continue to think of
doors being rectangles.

3. Colour Constancy. Colour constancy refers to the tendency to perceive objects as

retaining their colour even though lighting conditions may alter their appearance Your bright
orange car may edge toward yellow-grey as the hours wind their way through twilight to night
time. But when you finally locate it in the parking lot, you will still think of it as being orange.
Information about the nature of the illumination and the colour of surrounding objects are
also cues to colour constancy. When these cues are eliminated, colour constancy diminishes
or disappears. If you look at a tomato through a narrow tube so that you do not know the
nature of the object or the source and kind of illumination, the tomato will appear to be blue
or brown or any other colour depending on the wavelength of the light being reflected from it.
Without colour constancy cues we see the colour of objects according to the wavelength of
light being reflected to the eye.

4. Brightness Constancy. Brightness constancy is the tendency to perceive an object as

being just as bright even though lighting conditions change in its intensity. The same grey
square is perceived as brighter when placed within a black background than when placed
within a white background. Again consider the role of experience. If it were night-time, we
would expect grey to fade to near blackness. The fact that grey with black square stimulates
the eye with equal intensity suggests that it must be very much brighter than the grey with
white square. Coal looks just as black to us in bright sunlight as in the dark. The same thing
may be said about a piece of white chalk in shadow and in bright light. Visual objects
somehow retain their degree of whiteness or blackness even under varying conditions of
illumination. If our perception of objects were based entirely on the amount of light reflected
from their surfaces, a coal in bright light would have appeared less black than a white chalk
in the dark because a coal in bright light will reflect more light than a white chalk in the dark.
As this does not happen, it simply means that our perception of brightness is not dependent
entirely on the light reflected from an object.

Experimental work on brightness constancy has shown that the perceived brightness of an
object is based upon the ratio between the illumination of an object and its surrounding.

All these types of perceptual constancy play a key role in making the world quite
understandable, manageable for our harmonious adjustment. In absence of this the world
would have been a barrage of shapes, sizes, degrees of brightness and colours etc., and the
perception of objects would have been utterly confusing leading to road accidents while
driving a vehicle. We enjoy perceptual constancy based on our previous experience,
knowledge and familiarity with the perceived objects.