Vision, Touch, and the Value of Pictures

Author(s):  
Dominic McIver Lopes

Since those born blind can draw and interpret raised-line drawings, depiction is not an essentially visual medium. Conceding this, Robert Hopkins denies that raised-line drawings can be works of pictorial art: tactile experiences of raised-line drawings are not aesthetic experiences. This paper addresses Hopkins’s concerns. The reasons given for evaluating a picture aesthetically can cite its tactile qualities instead of its visual qualities. In particular, a raised-line picture can be valued for how it evokes a tactile experience of a worldly scene, just as a visual picture can be valued for how it evokes a visual experience of its subject.

1988 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 241-262 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan D. Manning

This article proposes a means of characterizing the difference between technical and literary writing, involving a theory of representation in which these distinct writing types are comparable to distinct types of visual representation. Any difference is only intelligible relative to a background of similarlity, but recent discussions of technical writing emphasize its similarity to literature and ignore significant differences. Distinct types of line drawings replicate the literary/technical contrast in a visual medium. This arises from two factors: 1) the way in which the drawing/text is perceived by the viewer/reader, as a substitute or as a standard; and 2) the predominant type of detail in the drawing/text, iterative or contrastive. Literature is most effective if perceived as a substitute for reality, predominated by iterative detail. Technical writing is most effective if perceived as a standard for evaluating reality, predominated by contrastive detail.


Perception ◽  
1989 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 379-389 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morton A Heller

Two experiments are reported on the contribution of visual experience to tactile perception. In the first experiment, sighted, congenitally blind, and late blind individuals made tactual matches to tangible embossed shapes. In the second experiment, the same subjects attempted tactile identification of raised-line drawings. The three groups did not differ in the accuracy of shape matching, but both groups of blind subjects were much faster than the sighted. Late blind observers were far better than the sighted or congenitally blind at tactile picture identification. Four of the twelve pictures were correctly identified by most of the late blind subjects. The sighted and congenitally blind performed at comparable levels in picture naming. There was no evidence that visual experience alone aided the sighted in the tactile task under investigation, since they performed no better than did the early blind. The superiority of the late blind suggests that visual exposure to drawings and the rules of pictorial representation may help tactile picture identification when combined with a history of tactual experience.


2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (6) ◽  
pp. 1482-1488
Author(s):  
Jennifer J. Thistle

Purpose Previous research with children with and without disabilities has demonstrated that visual–perceptual factors can influence the speech of locating a target on an array. Adults without disabilities often facilitate the learning and use of a child's augmentative and alternative communication system. The current research examined how the presence of symbol background color influenced the speed with which adults without disabilities located target line drawings in 2 studies. Method Both studies used a between-subjects design. In the 1st study, 30 adults (ages 18–29 years) located targets in a 16-symbol array. In the 2nd study, 30 adults (ages 18–34 years) located targets in a 60-symbol array. There were 3 conditions in each study: symbol background color, symbol background white with a black border, and symbol background white with a color border. Results In the 1st study, reaction times across groups were not significantly different. In the 2nd study, participants in the symbol background color condition were significantly faster than participants in the other conditions, and participants in the symbol background white with black border were significantly slower than participants in the other conditions. Conclusion Communication partners may benefit from the presence of background color, especially when supporting children using displays with many symbols.


Author(s):  
Robert J. Hartsuiker ◽  
Lies Notebaert

A picture naming experiment in Dutch tested whether disfluencies in speech can arise from difficulties in lexical access. Speakers described networks consisting of line drawings and paths connecting these drawings, and we manipulated picture name agreement. Consistent with our hypothesis, there were more pauses and more self-corrections in the low name agreement condition than the high name agreement condition, but there was no effect on repetitions. We also considered determiner frequency. There were more self-corrections and more repetitions when the picture name required the less frequent (neuter-gender) determiner “het” than the more frequent (common-gender) determiner “de”. These data suggest that difficulties in distinct stages of language production result in distinct patterns of disfluencies.


Author(s):  
Toby J. Lloyd-Jones ◽  
Juergen Gehrke ◽  
Jason Lauder

We assessed the importance of outline contour and individual features in mediating the recognition of animals by examining response times and eye movements in an animal-object decision task (i.e., deciding whether or not an object was an animal that may be encountered in real life). There were shorter latencies for animals as compared with nonanimals and performance was similar for shaded line drawings and silhouettes, suggesting that important information for recognition lies in the outline contour. The most salient information in the outline contour was around the head, followed by the lower torso and leg regions. We also observed effects of object orientation and argue that the usefulness of the head and lower torso/leg regions is consistent with a role for the object axis in recognition.


Author(s):  
Christian C. Steciuch ◽  
Ryan D. Kopatich ◽  
Daniel P. Feller ◽  
Amanda M. Durik ◽  
Keith Millis

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rolf A. Zwaan ◽  
Leonora C. Coppens ◽  
Liselotte Gootjes

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