title: Visual search for simple volumetric shapes.
abstract: Five experiments measured reaction time (RT) to detect the presence or absence of a simple volumetric shape (target) dependent on the number of display items (distractors) and their depicted three-dimensional (3-D) orientation. Experiments 1-4 examined every pairwise combination of two different simple volumetric shapes in two 3-D orientations. Conditions exhibiting "pop-out" could be predicted by differences in their two-dimensional (2-D) features. Conditions in which search was slower support previously found search asymmetries for particular 2-D features. When the distractors were a mixture of the other shapes in the same 3-D orientation, search was serial, except when the target had a curved principal axis (Experiment 5). The results suggest that these simple volumetric shapes are not processed preattentively.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Georgia, Athens 30602.
authors.forename: J M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Weisstein
authors.forename: J G
authors.initials: JG
authors.lastname: May
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D003867:Depth Perception; D004193:Discrimination Learning; D006801:Humans; D009903:Optical Illusions; D009949:Orientation; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011601:Psychophysics; D011930:Reaction Time