Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2brh9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T07:07:32.536Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Minimization of modal contours: An instance of an evolutionary internalized geometric regularity?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 August 2002

Giorgio Vallortigara
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology and B.R.A.I.N. Centre for Neuroscience, University of Trieste, 34123 Trieste, [email protected] http://www.psico.univ.trieste.it/labs/acn-lab/
Luca Tommasi
Affiliation:
Department of General Psychology, University of Padua, 35131 Padua, [email protected] http://www.psy.unipd.it/~ltommasi/

Abstract

The stratification in depth of chromatically homogeneous overlapping figures depends on a minimization rule which assigns the status of being “in front” to the figure that requires the formation of shorter modal contours. This rule has been proven valid also in birds, whose visual neuroanatomy is radically different from that of other mammals, thus suggesting an example of evolutionary convergence toward a perceptual universal. [Shepard]

Type
Brief Report
Copyright
© 2001 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)