Age-related differences in the detection of three-dimensional surfaces from optic flow.
The present study examined age-related differences in sensitivity to optic flow for the detection of 3-D surfaces. Observers were presented with optic flow displays simulating either a 3-D corrugated surface or a random velocity pattern and were asked to detect the 3-D corrugated surface display. Performance decrements were found for older (mean age = 71) compared with younger (mean age = 21) observers across variations in density and corrugation frequency. Older observers also showed performance decrements for a motion coherence task, but performance on this task was not significantly correlated with performance on the 3-D surface detection task. These results suggest that performance on 2-D motion tasks is not necessarily predictive of performance on complex 3-D motion tasks. In addition, the results suggest that different processes underlie the analysis of 2-D and 3-D motion.
Andersen
G J
GJ
Department of Psychology, University of California, Riverside 92521, USA.
Atchley
P
P
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D004193:Discrimination Learning; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009039:Motion Perception; D009949:Orientation; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011601:Psychophysics; D012016:Reference Values