Further developments in the assimilation theory of geometric illusions: The adjacency,principle

Abstract

It is argued that the parallel lines illusion is the basic model for many visual distortions that are produced by geometric patterns. An experiment assessed the effect of moving the contextual contour away from the standard contour in two directions-away from the center of the attentive field and toward the center of the attentive field. The degree of illusion declined as the contextual magnitude moved away from the standard magnitude, but the rate of decline was more rapid when the contextual stimulus was moved away from the center of the attentive field. The results necessitated the addition of a new postulate for the assimilation theory of geometric illusions. This postulate states that the effectiveness of a contextual magnitude decreases as the distance between the contextual magnitude and the standard magnitude increases. The postulate was translated into a mathematical form in a manner analogous to the way in which the "attentive field" postulate was quantified. The new formula was successful in predicting both the pattern of means and the pattern of variances found in this study. The formula was cross-validated with data from the Ponzo and reversed Mueller-Lyer illusions. © 1976 Psychonomic Society, Inc.