Perception / i-Perception

🧠 Can we average information across our senses in the same way? New research finds that averaging precision is correlated across vision, hearing and touch, suggesting partially shared processes. However, perceptual biases appear to be more modality-specific. 🔗 doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🧠 Can a diagnosis of face blindness improve social relationships? Positive effects of a congenital prosopagnosia diagnosis predominate. Participants reported developing new recognition strategies, improving interpersonal skills and experiencing better relationships. 🔗 doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🔢 Does spatial position influence how we perceive number? New research in i-Perception compares three cognitive systems, finding that spatial position affects approximate number processing differently from object tracking and visual working memory. 🔗 doi.org/10.1177/2041...

📏 How does context affect our perception of length? New research in Perception explores how the filled-space illusion interacts with differences in visual perception across the visual field, finding that the two effects may be distinguishable. Read the paper: doi.org/10.1177/0301...

🌀 Can we perceive motion and stillness at the same time? New research in i-Perception finds that motion and stillness can be disentangled in the perception of illusory motion. Read the paper: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🔍 Where do we see symmetry in everyday images? New research introduces a new method for mapping perceived symmetry across natural scenes and artworks, finding a strong preference for vertical axes of symmetry. 🏆 The paper was awarded an Early Career Best Paper Prize! doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🙃 How does face orientation affect own- and other-race face processing? New research in i-Perception finds that own-race faces showed a sharper change after 90° rotation, while other-race faces showed a more gradual change. Read the paper: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

📊 Does colour help us spot relationships in bar charts? New research in i-Perception finds that while spatial layout affects what we detect, static and dynamic colour cues don’t necessarily improve detection. Read the paper: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🔗 Can we really ignore the visual binding problem? Examples of visual illusions show that features such as colour and motion can be incorrectly combined, providing evidence that visual binding remains an important problem for understanding perception👁️ Read more: doi.org/10.1177/0301...

👁️ Can your eyes respond to an illusion as if it were real? Researchers found that pupil size and eye movements changed on if people saw a hole or a bump. The eyes responded to the perceived 3D shape — even though the stimulus was completely flat. 🌀 Read more: doi.org/10.1177/0301...

Negative emotions don't always rely on colour in the same way🧠🎨 Comparing 100 colour images with their greyscale versions, researchers found that removing colour reduced disgust but had little effect on fear. Read more: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🏆 Award-winning ECR Paper Can we recognise emotions in painted faces? 🎨 116 portraits, six basic emotions — but many didn’t fit neatly into one category. Perhaps emotions in art are more complex than six labels suggest. doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🌈 It’s starting! Karl Gegenfurtner is now delivering the ECVP 2026 Perception Lecture: “Colour Vision — Then and Now” at the Bournemouth International Centre. This lecture is proudly sponsored by Perception & i-Perception. 👏 Enjoy the lecture! 👀 #ECVP2026 #ColorVision #VisionScience

🕊️ Remembering Tim Meese Two obituaries celebrate Tim’s life, work and lasting impact on our vision science community, offering different perspectives on a much-missed colleague, collaborator and friend. 🔗 journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/... journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

🎤 Perception Lecture at ECVP 2026 We are delighted to announce the Perception Lecture, sponsored by SAGE journals Perception and i-Perception. Join Karl Gegenfurtner for: 🌈 “Colour Vision — Then and Now” 📅 Sunday 23 August 📍 Bournemouth International Centre #ECVP2026 #ColorVision

🌊 👀 Can two simple patterns create something that really isn't there? This new paper introduces Dynamic Illusory Waves (DIWAs)—a striking illusion where relative motion gives rise to flowing, transparent phantom surfaces. Make your own: maltacogsci.org/diwa/ Full paper: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

✨ How does the visual system combine conflicting information from both eyes? 👁️ Using segmented ring stimuli, this study shows that binocular lustre is shaped by a weighted integration of visual signals—not a winner-takes-all process. 📖 doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🖼️➡️🧠 How do we turn fragments into a complete picture? This study used slit-viewing tasks to investigate visual temporal integration and found no relationship between autistic traits, imagination difficulties, and task performance. 🔗 doi.org/10.1177/2041...

Beauty and attractiveness aren't quite the same. 🎨 Ratings of art portraits showed that beauty judgments were linked to objective image properties A reminder that what makes an artwork beautiful isn't necessarily what makes its subject attractive. Read more: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🎨 Is generative AI creating art—or high-resolution kitsch? 🤖 Does AI excel at producing familiar, emotionally appealing images. Or does it risk reducing ambiguity, perspective shifts, and the perceptual disruption that gives art its transformative power. Full paper: doi.org/10.1177/0301...

🎯 One set of printed images, many different percepts. 💡 Under changing illumination, observers reported effects ranging from glow and flow to rotation, depth, and material changes—all without altering the images themselves. Full paper: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

👀 Can a visual effect make something feel sticky? 🖐️ As participants pulled their fingers apart, a deforming region stretched before breaking. 📈 The farther it stretched, the stickier it was perceived to be—even without any physical resistance. Full paper doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🎯 Three ways to perceive the same object ⬛ The figure compares luminance-, disparity-, and two-frame motion-defined forms. 📏 Even though motion-defined objects quickly faded from view, observers judged their shape almost as accurately as the other two conditions. Full paper doi.org/10.1177/0301...

😷 Do face masks affect social judgments differently in people with autistic traits? 🤝 Masked faces were perceived as more trustworthy 📈 Masked faces were also rated as more competent 🧩 These effects did not differ between individuals with high and low autistic traits ↓ doi.org/10.1177/0301...

🎨 Why do these shapes look three-dimensional? 💡 Robert Fones' paintings are illuminated as though light comes from above and slightly left—a direction known to enhance depth perception 👁️ Turn them upside down and some viewers see the shapes reverse Full Paper↓ doi.org/10.1177/2041...

A number sense for action ✋ Children's performance on an action-based numerosity task predicted arithmetic ability ➕ More strongly than dot or flash estimation tasks This i-Perception study points to a unique role for sensorimotor numerosity in mathematical development. ↓ doi.org/10.1177/2041...

🧠 People who struggle to identify emotions tend to have weaker awareness of internal body signals 🕹️ Moving in sync with a VR body increases the feeling that it’s “yours” This Perception study shows emotion awareness and body signals help shape embodiment in VR. doi.org/10.1177/0301...

Psychophysics & sample size debate 👀Small “n” isn’t automatically weak 📊Large “n” isn’t always the only path to rigour This Perception Editorial revisits a long-standing tension in vision science Small n does not mean poor research. ↓ Full paper: doi.org/10.1177/0301...

With profound sadness we announce the sudden and unexpected death of our Editor-in-Chief, Tim Meese. A founding editor of i-Perception, Tim was a pillar of the vision science community and instrumental in shaping the landscape of scientific publishing in our field.

AI faces vs real faces. 👀 People can tell them apart 🤖 But AI faces may be recognised more accurately This new Perception paper suggests AI faces engage perception and memory differently. ↓ Full paper: doi.org/10.1177/0301...

Emotion recognition is influenced by movement.​ 👀 Static faces draw more attention to the eyes—but gaze shifts when expressions change.​ 🎥 This new Perception paper highlights why more realistic stimuli matter.​ ↓ Full paper:​ doi.org/10.1177/0301...

Put on red–cyan glasses🔴🔵 A flat image can reveal depth. Anaglyphs create stereoscopic perception by sending different signals to each eye. This new i-Perception paper explores how. ↓ Full paper: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Look closely👀 Does the number of items feel stable—or does it change? Numerosity perception is surprisingly flexible. Explored in this new i-Perception paper. ↓ Full paper: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

Quick question: 🖐️ or 📳 — which makes an experience feel more realistic? Touch can increase immersion, presence, and engagement. But can haptic tech match the nuance of human interaction? This new i-Perception paper explores both. ↓ Full paper: doi.org/10.1177/2041...

Are you so interested in perception that you've started to ask questions that border on the philosophical? 💭 If so then you'll love Perception's new Philosophy Corner - now open for submissions ✨️ For more details please see: journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

Great new initiative from the editors of Perception: Philosophy Corner. A forum for "accessible reflections on the conceptual foundations of sensory/perception science where empirical insight meets philosophical inquiry". journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

Already halfway through the fantastic @ecvp.bsky.social‬ conference in Mainz! It started beautifully with the Perception Lecture given by Astrid Kappers. Looking forward to reading the paper linked to the lecture that will be published in Perception!

💭 Reduction in distraction due to perceptual load: A failure to replicate by Snowden and Gray "These results show that load theory is, at best, an incomplete explanation of how stimuli are selected, and the fate of the non-attended stimuli." journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

⬅️➡️ "Delay adaptation does not transfer between discrete button press actions and continuous control" by van Dam et al Delay adaptation occurs for stylus (graphics tablet) and arrow buttons (keyboard) but doesn't transfer between response styles journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

I really appreciated @mamassian.bsky.social's editorial in @pec-ipe.bsky.social about using LLMs for peer review. The review process faces serious challenges, to be sure: I don't know anyone who hasn't struggled to find reviewers these days. Still, we can't ignore the issues raised here.

🔵 Qualitative shape from shading by Norman and Todd This work suggests that humans can distinguish between luminance caused by surface orientation compared to differences in illuminance caused by multiple light sources, cast shadows, and indirect reflections 🌟 journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

⚫️/⬛️? Reassessing the curvature effect in tables and chairs by Chuquichambi et al People typically show a preference for curved rather than angular contours, but findings from this paper revealed no clear preference for curvature in chairs or tables ⬇️ journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

"And just like microwaves are now mostly used to reheat old meals, LLMs mostly regurgitate some old text that they were trained on. This is hardly what we expect when we ask reviewers to critically evaluate the quality of an original manuscript." Definitely worth a read 💭 @mamassian.bsky.social

🖼 The embodied experience of abstract art: Moving across the 20th century by Cox and van Klaveren This article looks at the emerging relationship between artwork and one's bodily movements and associated embodied affective states 💭 ⬇️ journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

👂👃 The diatonic sound of scent imagery by Pimentel et al This article finds that major modes were perceived as brighter and more liked than minor modes, which was similar for floral & fresh fragrances relative to oriental & woody fragrances 🌸🌟 ⬇️ journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

⚡️🎮 What role does touch play in active entertainment? A narrative review of tactile feedback in gaming - Gao & Spence Considers the history of tactile feedback to see if there's scope for tactile simulation to enhance interactivity across active entertainment ⬇️ journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Do people with cerebral visual impairment (CVI) have mental imagery? 💭 Assessing visual mental imagery abilities in cerebral visual impairment by Manley, Ravenscroft and Merabet ⬇️⬇️⬇️ journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

🏆 Did you know we offer early career best paper prizes? You could be eligible if you're the primary author and are within 5 years of completing your PhD - definitely worth a look! For the full list of papers awarded these prizes, please see the link below: journals.sagepub.com/page/ipe/col...