title: Effective 3-D shape discrimination survives retinal blur.
abstract: A single experiment evaluated observers' ability to visually discriminate 3-D object shape, where the 3-D structure was defined by motion, texture, Lambertian shading, and occluding contours. The observers' vision was degraded to varying degrees by blurring the experimental stimuli, using 2.0-, 2.5-, and 3.0-diopter convex lenses. The lenses reduced the observers' acuity from -0.091 LogMAR (in the no-blur conditions) to 0.924 LogMAR (in the conditions with the most blur; 3.0-diopter lenses). This visual degradation, although producing severe reductions in visual acuity, had only small (but significant) effects on the observers' ability to discriminate 3-D shape. The observers' shape discrimination performance was facilitated by the objects' rotation in depth, regardless of the presence or absence of blur. Our results indicate that accurate global shape discrimination survives a considerable amount of retinal blur.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Western Kentucky University, 1906 College Heights Blvd. #21030, Bowling Green, KY 42101-1030, USA. farley.norman@wku.edu
authors.forename: J Farley
authors.initials: JF
authors.lastname: Norman
authors.forename: Amanda M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Beers
authors.forename: Jessica S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Holmin
authors.forename: Alexandria M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Boswell
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention; D015350:Contrast Sensitivity; D003867:Depth Perception; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009039:Motion Perception; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D010469:Perceptual Distortion; D010470:Perceptual Masking; D011601:Psychophysics; D014792:Visual Acuity; D055815:Young Adult