Abstract
The classical psychophysical approach to human perception has been to study isolated aspects of perception using well-controlled and strongly simplified laboratory stimuli. This so-called cue reduction technique has successfully led to the identification of numerous perceptual mechanisms, and has in many cases guided the uncoverage of neural correlates (see chapters elsewhere in this volume). Its limitations, however, lie in the almost complete ignorance of the intimate relationship among action, perception, and the environment in which we live. Real world situations are so different from the stimuli used in classical psychophysics and the context in which they are presented that applying laboratory results to daily life situations often becomes impractical, if not impossible. At the Max-PlanckInstitute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen, we pursue a behavioral approach to human action and perception that proves especially well-suited for studying more complex cognitive functions, such as object recognition and spatial cognition. The recent availability of high-fidelity “virtual reality” environments enables us to provide subjects a level of sensory realism and dynamic sensory feedback that approaches their experiences in the real world. At the same time, we can keep the ultimate control over all stimulus aspects that are required by the rules of psychophysics. In this chapter, we take a closer look at these developments in spatial cognition research and present results from several different experimental studies that we have conducted using this approach.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Bedford, F. L. (1993). Perceptual learning. Psychol. Learn. Motiv., 30: 1–60.
Bedford, F. L. (1999). Keeping perception accurate. Trends Cog. Sci., 3: 4–11.
Blake, A. and Yuille, A. L. (1992). Active Vision. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Bülthoff, H. H., Foese-Mallot, B. M., and Mallot, H. A. (1997). Virtuelle Realität als Methode der modernen Hirnforschung (translation: Virtual reality as a method for modern brain research). In H. Krapp and T. Wägenbauer (Ed-s.), Künstliche Paradiese — Virtuelle Realitäten, pp. 241–260, Wilhelm Fink Verlag, München.
Carlin, A. S., Hoffmann, H. G., and Weghorst, S. (1997). Virtual reality and tactile augmentation in the treatment of spider phobia: a case report. Behay. Res. Ther., 35: 153–158.
Chance, S. S., Gaunet, F., Beall, A. C., and Loomis, J. M. (1998). Locomotion mode affects the updating of objects encountered during travel: The contribution of vestibular and proprioceptive inputs to path integration. Presence: Teleop. and Virtual Environ., 7: 168–178.
Chatziastros, A., Wallis, G. M., and Bülthoff, H. H. (1998). Lane changing without visual feedback? Perception, 27 (suppl.): 59.
Chatziastros, A., Wallis, G. M., and Bülthoff, H. H. (1999). The effect of field of view and surface texture on driver steering performance (Utiliser un environnement virtuel pour évaluer indicateurs qui affectent la performance du conducteur). Proc. of Vision in Vehicles VII, Sept. 1997, Marseille, France. In A. G. Gale„ I. D Brown, C. M. Haslegrave, and S. P. Taylor (Eds.), Vision in Vehicles VII, Amsterdam: North-Holland/Elsevier Science B. V.
Christou, C. G. and Bülthoff, H. H. (2000). View dependency in scene recognition after active learning. Mem. Cog., 27: 996–1007.
Cunningham, D. W., Billock, V. A., and Tsou, B. H. (2000). Sensorimotor adaptation to violations of temporal contiguity and the perception of causality. Manuscript submitted for publication.
Cunningham, D. W. and Tsou, B. H. (1999). Sensorimotor adaptation to temporally displaced feedback. Invest. Ophthal. Vis. Sci., 40: 585.
Darken, R. P., Allard, T., and Achille, L. B. (1998). Spatial orientation and wayfinding in large-scale virtual spaces: An introduction. Presence: Teleop. Virtual Environ., 7:101–107.
Darken, R. P., Cockayne, W. R., and Carmein, D. (1997). The omni-directional treadmill: a locomotion device for virtual worlds. Proc. UIST ‘87, October 14–17, 1997, Banff, Canada, pp. 213–221.
Distler, H. (1996). Psychophysical experiments in virtual environments. In Virtual Reality World ‘86 Conference Documentation,München: Computerwoche Verlag.
Distler, H. K., van Veen, H. A. H. C., Braun, S. J., and Bülthoff, H. H. (1998). Untersuchung komplexer Wahrnehmungs-und Verhaltensleistungen des Menschen in virtuellen Welten (The investigation of complex human perception and behavior in virtual worlds). In I. Rügge, B. Robben, E. Hornecker, and F. W. Bruns (Eds.), Arbeiten und Begreifen: Neue Mensch-MaschineSchnittstellen, pp. 159–172, Münster: Lit Verlag.
Distler, H. K., van Veen, H. A. H. C., Braun, S. J., Heinz, W., Franz, M. O. and Bülthoff, H. H. (1998). Navigation in real and virtual environments: Judging orientation and distance in a large-scale landscape. In M. Göbel, J. Landauer, M. Wapler and U. Lang (Eds.), Virtual Environments ‘88: Proceedings of the Eurographics Workshop in Stuttgart, Germany, June 16–18, 1998, Springer Verlag, Wien.
Epstein, R. and Kanwisher, N. (1998). A cortical representation of the local visual environment. Nature, 392: 598–601.
Ernst, M. O., Banks, M. S., and Bülthoff, H. H. (2000). Touch can change visual slant perception. Nature Neurosci., 3: 69–73.
Ernst, M. O., van Veen, H. A. H. C., Goodale, M. A., and Bülthoff, H. H. (1998). Grasping with conflicting visual and haptic information. Invest. Ophthal. Vs. Sci., 39: 624
Gibson, J. J. (1966). The Senses Considered as Perceptual Systems. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Gibson, J. J. (1979). The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Gibson, W. (1984). Neuromancer. Great Britain: Victor Gollancz Ltd.
Gillner, S. and Mallot, H. A. (1998). Navigation and acquisition of spatial knowledge in a virtual maze. J. Cog. Neurosci., 10: 445–463.
Glantz, K., Durlach, N. I., Barnett, R. C., and Aviles, W. A. (1996). Virtual Reality (VR) for psychotherapy: From the physical to the social environment. Psychotherapy, 33: 464–473.
Glantz, K., Durlach, N. I., Barnett, R. C., and Aviles, W. A. (1997). Virtual reality (VR) and psychotherapy: Opportunities and Challenges. Presence: Teleop. Virtual Environ., 6: 87–105.
Harris, C. S. (1965). Perceptual adaptation to inverted, reversed, and displaced vision. Psych. Rev., 72: 419–444.
Harris, C. S. (1980). Insight or out of sight? Two examples of perceptual plasticity in the human adult. In C. S. Harris (Ed.), Visual Coding and Adaptability, pp. 95–149, Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Heisenberg, M. and Wolf, R. (1984). Vision in Drosophila. Berlin: Springer Verlag.
Hengstenberg, R. (1993). Multisensory control in insect oculomotor systems. In F. A. Miles and J. Wallman (Eds.), Visual Motion and its Role in the Stabilization of Gaze, Elsevier Science.
Koenderink, J. J. (1999). Virtual psychophysics. Guest editorial, Perception, 28: 669–674.
Levin, D. T. and Simons, D. J. (1997). Failure to detect changes to attended objects in motion pictures. Psychon. Bull. Rev., 4: 501–506.
Maguire, E. A., Burgess, N., Donnett, J. G., Frackowiak, R. S. J., Frith, C. D., and O’ Keefe, J. (1998a). Knowing where and getting there: a human navigation network. Science, 280: 21–924.
Maguire, E. A., Frith, C. D., Burgess, N., Donnett, J. G., and O’Keefe, J. (1998b). Knowing where things are: Parahippocampal involvement in encoding object locations in virtual large-scale space. J. Cog. Neurosci., 10: 61–76.
Mallot, H. A. and Gillner, S. (2000). Route navigation without place recognition: What is recognized in recognition-triggered responses? Percept., 29: 43–55.
Mallot, H. A., Giliner, S., van Veen, H. A. H. C. and Bülthoff, H. H. (1998). Behavioral experiments in spatial cognition using virtual reality. In C. Freksa, C. Habel, and K. F. Wender (Eds.), Spatial Cognition: An interdisciplinary approach to representing and processing spatial knowledge, Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence Vol. 1404, Berlin: Springer Verlag.
Mochnatzki, H. F., Steck, S. D., and Mallot, H. A. (1999). Geographic slant as a source of information in maze navigation. In N. Elsner and U. Eysel (Eds.),Göttingen Neurobiology Report 1999, Volume II, abstract No. 875, Stuttgart: G. Thieme Verlag.
Mühlberger, A., Hetlntann, M., Wiedemann, G., and Pauli, P. (2000). Treatment of fear of flying by exposure in virtual reality. Manuscript submitted for publication.
Péruch, P. and Gaunet, F. (1998). Virtual environments as a promising tool for investigating human spatial cognition. Curr. Psych. Cog., 17: 881–899.
Reichardt, W. (1973). Musterinduzierte Flugorientierung. Verhaltensversuche an der Fliege Musca domestica. Naturwiss., 60: 122–138.
Riecke, B. (1998). Untersuchung des menschlichen Navigationsverhalten anhand von Heimfindeexperimenten in virtuellen Umgebungen (Studying human navigation behavior by performing homing experiments in virtual environments). Unpublished Masters Thesis, Physics Department of the EberhardKarls-Universität Tübingen, Germany.
Rothbaum, B. O., Hodges, L. F., Kooper, R., Opdyke, D., Williford, J. S., and North, M. (1995). Effectiveness of computer-generated (virtual reality) graded exposure in the treatment of acrophobia. Am. J. Psychiatry, 152: 626–628.
Ruddle, R. A. (1999). The problem of arriving in one place and finding that you’re somewhere else. Proc. of the workshop on Spatial Cognition in Real and Virtual Environments, April 27–28, 1999, Tübingen, Germany, p. 58.
Ruddle, R. A., Howes, A., Payne, S. J. and Jones, D. M. (2000). The effects of hyperlinks on navigation in virtual environments, Manuscript submitted for publication.
Seilen, K. (1998). Schätzen von Richtungen in realen and virtuellen Umgebungen (Estimation of Directions in Real and Virtual Environments). Unpublished Masters Thesis, Biology Department of the Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen, Germany.
Sheridan, T. B. and Ferrel, W. R., (1963). Remote manipulative control with transmission delay. Percept. Motors Skills, 20: 1070–1072.
Simons, D. J. and Levin, D. T. (1998). Failure to detect changes to people in real-world interaction. Psych. Bull. and Rev., 5: 644–649.
Slater, M. and Wilbur, S. (1997). A framework for immersive virtual environments (FIVE): Speculations on the role of presence in virtual environments. Presence: Teleop. Virtual Environ., 6: 603–616.
Steck, S. D. and Mallot, H. A. (2000). The role of global and local landmarks in virtual environment navigation. Presence: Teleop. Virtual Environ., 9: 69–83.
Usoh, M., Arthur, K., Whitton, M. C., Bastos, R., Steed, A., Slater, M. and Brooks, F. P. Jr. (1999). Walking walking-in-place, flying, in virtual environments. Proc. ACM SIGGRAPH ‘89, pp. 359–364, Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
van Veen, H. A. H. C., Distler, H. K., Braun, S. J., and Bülthoff, H. H. (1998). Navigating through a virtual city: Using virtual reality technology to study human action and perception. Future Generation Comp. Sys., 14: 231–242.
van Veen, H. A. H. C., Sellen, K., and Bülthoff, H. H. (1998). Pointing to invisible landmarks in real and virtual environments. Invest. Ophthal. Vis. Sci., 39: 625.
van Veen, H. A. H. C., Riecke, B. E. and Bülthoff, H. H. (1999). Visual homing to a virtual home, Invest. Ophthal. Vis. Sci., 40: 798.
Wallis, G. and Bülthoff, H. H. (2000). What’s scene and not seen: Influences of movement and task upon what we see. Vis. Cog., 7.
Wallis, G. M., Chatziastros, A., and Bülthoff, H. H. (1997). Even experienced drivers have the wrong concept about how to change lanes. Percept., 26 (suppl.): 100.
Welch, R. B. (1978). Perceptual Modification: Adapting to Altered Sensory Environments. New York, NY: Academic Press.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2001 Springer Science+Business Media New York
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Bülthoff, H.H., van Veen, H.A.H.C. (2001). Vision and Action in Virtual Environments: Modern Psychophysics in Spatial Cognition Research. In: Jenkin, M., Harris, L. (eds) Vision and Attention. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-21591-4_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-21591-4_12
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4684-9520-1
Online ISBN: 978-0-387-21591-4
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive