Effect of Global Image Properties on Visual Cognition

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): We open our eyes and almost instantly experience a rich and detailed visual world. This experience seems to be composed by two distinct types of visual processes that differ in their scale of operation. Global processes rapidly compute summary information, such as the average size of objects in a scene, but do not represent the details of any particular object. More local processes do represent the details of individual objects, but appear to operate on just one or a small number of objects at a time. Traditionally these processes have been investigated independently. The goal of the present project is to determine how these two different levels of processing interact. Specifically, we plan to determine how the global properties of a scene influence our ability to represent the specific local details of objects within that scene. The results of this project will have important implications for understanding how global image properties are represented and how those properties influence perception and memory for the local details of objects. This could provide valuable insight into the nature of vision problems in different populations (e.g., Alzheimer s disease and autism), which could be useful for diagnostic purposes or for the design of visual materials used in therapy.