PATTERN RECOGNITION (continued):Queen Elizabeth’s vase, Palmer (1977)

<< PATTERN RECOGNITION (continued):Gestalt Theory of Perception

OBJECT PERCEPTION (continued):Segmentation, Recognition of object >>

Cognitive Psychology PSY 504

Lesson 18

PATTERN RECOGNITION (continued)

Gestalt Theory of Perception

Gestalt principles are basically principles of perception.

This figure is consisted on four lines two are horizontal and two are vertical. But some people

may be perceived it like a cross.

People perceive these figures differently.

There are more chances this figure is perceived as cross.

Cognitive Psychology PSY 504

This following pattern may be perceived as square. Some can also perceive it as cross.

So, it is human tendency to complete the figure even some information is missing.

People perceive it as square even lines are not completed.

Gestalt principles of Organization

Most common principles of gestalt theory are;

Proximity

Cognitive Psychology PSY 504

The law of proximity says that items which are close together in space or time tend to be

perceived as belonging together or forming an organized group.

Similarity

This law says that same things are considered one thing. Similar items tend to be

organized together.

Good continuation

The tendency to perceive a line that starts in one way as continuation in the same way.

Closure

It refers to perceptual processes that organize the perceived world by filling in gaps in

stimulation.

Good Form

It is a type of closure. We fill in the gaps perceive form rather than disconnected lines.

Symmetry

It says that there is a tendency to organize things to make a balanced or symmetrical

figure that includes all the parts.

Some more examples

These are examples of gestalt principles.

Queen Elizabeth's vase

It is a gift that was given to the Queen Elizabeth on her silver jubilee. It is a vase but we perceive

it as a figure of two faces. We change background in figure and figure into background. Figure

Cognitive Psychology PSY 504

and background is very important concept in Gestalt theory. This is crucial concept in visual

perception.

Palmer (1977)

Palmer (1977) studied subjects' recognition of figures such as the ones in following figure.

He first showed subjects stimuli such as (a) and then asked them to decide whether fragments

(b)-(e) were part of the original figure. Stimuli (a) tends to organize itself into a triangle and a bent

letter n. Palmer found that subjects could recognize the parts most rapidly when they were the

segments predicted by the Gestalt principles. Thus we see that recognition depends critically on

the initial segmentation of the figure. The figure is;

Object Perception

The basic idea is that a familiar object can be seen as a known configuration of simple

components.

Marr & Nishihara (1978) purposed that familiar objects can be seen as configuration of simple

pipe-like components. For instance, in the following figure the human model is presented.

Different types and sizes of cylinders make a human model. We perceive these cylinders as

human model. The diagram of bird is also consisted on cylinders. Different sizes, types and

shapes of cylinders are used to make different diagrams. It is a Computer model.

Cognitive Psychology PSY 504

Another contribution was made by Biederman in 1987.

Biederman (1987) has proposed that there are three stages in recognition of an object as a

configuration of simpler components.

Segmentation into sub-objects

Classify the category of each sub-object

Recognition as a pattern made of sub-objects

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