Abstract
The retinal image of an object does not contain information about its actual size. Size must instead be inferred from extraretinal cues for which distance information makes an essential contribution. Asynchronies in the arrival time across visual and auditory sensory components of an audiovisual event can reliably cue its distance, although this cue has been largely neglected in vision research. Here we demonstrate that audio-visual asynchronies can produce a shift in the apparent size of an object and attribute this shift to a change in perceived distance. In the present study participants were asked to match the perceived size of a test circle paired with an asynchronous sound to a variable-size probe circle paired with a simultaneous sound. The perceived size of the circle increased when the sound followed its onset with delays up to around 100 ms. For longer sound delays and sound leads, no effect was seen. We attribute this selective modulation in perceived visual size to audiovisual timing influences on the intrinsic relationship between size and distance. This previously unsuspected cue to distance reveals a surprisingly interactive system using multisensory information for size/distance perception.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Brainard DH (1997) The psychophysics toolbox. Spat Vis 10:433–436
Cappe C, Thut G, Romei V, Murray MM (2009) Selective integration of auditory-visual looming cues by humans. Neuropsychologia 47:1045–1052
Epstein W, Park J, Casey A (1961) The current status of the size-distance hypotheses. Psychol Bull 58:491–514
Gallace A, Spence C (2006) Multisensory synesthetic interactions in the speeded classification of visual size. Percept Psychophys 68:1191–1203
Gilinsky AS (1951) Perceived size and distance in visual space. Psychol Rev 58:460–482
Gilinsky AS (1955) The effect of attitude upon the perception of size. Am J Psychol 68:173–192
Gregory RL (1997) Eye and brain. Princeton University Press, New Jersey
Harris LR, Harrar V, Jaekl P, Kopinska A (2010) Mechanisms of simultaneity constancy. In: Nijhawan R, Khurana B (eds) Space and time in perception and action. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Hershenson M (ed) (1989) The moon illusion. Lawrence Erlbaum & Associates, New Jersey
Kaufman L, Kaufman JH, Noble R, Edlund S, Bai S, King T (2006) Perceptual distance and the constancy of size and stereoscopic depth. Spat Vis 19:439–457
Kaufman L, Vassiliades V, Noble R, Alexander R, Kaufman J, Edlund S (2007) Perceptual distance and the moon illusion. Spat Vis 20:155–175
Kilpatrick FP, Ittelson WH (1953) The size-distance invariance hypothesis. Psych Rev 60:223–231
King AJ (2005) Multisensory integration: strategies for synchronization. Curr Biol 15:R339–R341
Kitagawa N, Ichihara S (2002) Hearing visual motion in depth. Nature 416:172–174
Kopinska A, Harris LR (2004) Simultaneity constancy. Perception 33:1049–1060
Meredith MA, Nemitz JW, Stein BE (1987) Determinants of multisensory integration in superior colliculus neurons. I. Temporal factors. J Neurosci 7:3215–3229
Parise CV, Spence C (2009) When birds of a feather flock together: synesthetic correspondences modulate audiovisual integration in non-synesthetes. PLoS One 4:e5664
Ross HE, Plug C (2002) The mystery of the moon illusion: exploring size perception. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Schlosberg H (1950) A note on depth perception, size constancy, and related topics. Psychol Rev 57:314–317
Shams L, Kim R (2010) Crossmodal influences on visual perception. Phys Life Rev 7:269–284
Spence C, Squire S (2003) Multisensory integration: maintaining the perception of synchrony. Curr Bio 13:R519–R521
Valjamae A, Soto-Faraco S (2008) Filling-in visual motion with sounds. Acta Psychol (Amst) 129:249–254
Vishwanath D, Blaser E (2010) Retinal blur and the perception of egocentric distance. J Vis 10:1–16
Watson AB, Pelli DG (1983) QUEST: a Bayesian adaptive psychometric method. Percept Psychophys 33:113–120
Acknowledgments
LRH is supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. SS-F and PJ are supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (PSI2010-15426 and Consolider INGENIO CSD2007-00012), Comissionat per a Universitats i Recerca del DIUE-Generalitat de Catalunya (SRG2009-092), and the European Research Council (StG-2010 263145).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Jaekl, P., Soto-Faraco, S. & Harris, L.R. Perceived size change induced by audiovisual temporal delays. Exp Brain Res 216, 457–462 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-011-2948-9
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-011-2948-9