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Abstract:
It is well known that people have difficulties recognizing an object from novel views as compared to learned views, resulting in increased response times and errors. Simons et al (2002 Perception Psychophysics 64 521 - 530) reported, however, the elimination of this viewpoint dependence when novel views resulted from viewer movement instead of object movement. They suggest the contribution of extra-retinal information to object recognition. The aim of the present study was to clarify the underlying mechanism of this phenomenon and to investigate larger turning angles (45° - 180°, in 45° steps). Observers performed sequential-matching tasks with 5 original versus mirror-reversed objects (experiment 1) and with 10 different objects (experiment 2). Test views of the objects were manipulated either by viewer or object movement. Both experiments showed a significant overall advantage for viewer movements. Note, however, that performance was still viewpoint-dependent. Object recognition performance was also highly correlated with general mental spatial abilities assessed by a paper-and-pencil test. These results suggest an involvement of advantageous and cost-effective transformation mechanisms, but not a complete automatic spatial-updating mechanism, when observers move.
