TY - JOUR
T1 - The Thatcher illusion in humans and monkeys
AU - Dahl, Christoph D.
AU - Logothetis, Nikos K.
AU - Bülthoff, Heinrich H.
AU - Wallraven, Christian
PY - 2010/10/7
Y1 - 2010/10/7
N2 - Primates possess the remarkable ability to differentiate faces of group members and to extract relevant information about the individual directly from the face. Recognition of conspecific faces is achieved by means of holistic processing, i.e. The processing of the face as an unparsed, perceptual whole, rather than as the collection of independent features (part-based processing). The most striking example of holistic processing is the Thatcher illusion. Local changes in facial features are hardly noticeable when the whole face is inverted (rotated 1808), but strikingly grotesque when the face is upright. This effect can be explained by a lack of processing capabilities for locally rotated facial features when the face is turned upside down. Recently, a Thatcher illusion was described in the macaque monkey analogous to that known from human investigations. Using a habituation paradigm combined with eye tracking, we address the critical follow-up questions raised in the aforementioned study to show the Thatcher illusion as a function of the observer's species (humans and macaques), the stimulus' species (humans and macaques) and the level of perceptual expertise (novice, expert).
AB - Primates possess the remarkable ability to differentiate faces of group members and to extract relevant information about the individual directly from the face. Recognition of conspecific faces is achieved by means of holistic processing, i.e. The processing of the face as an unparsed, perceptual whole, rather than as the collection of independent features (part-based processing). The most striking example of holistic processing is the Thatcher illusion. Local changes in facial features are hardly noticeable when the whole face is inverted (rotated 1808), but strikingly grotesque when the face is upright. This effect can be explained by a lack of processing capabilities for locally rotated facial features when the face is turned upside down. Recently, a Thatcher illusion was described in the macaque monkey analogous to that known from human investigations. Using a habituation paradigm combined with eye tracking, we address the critical follow-up questions raised in the aforementioned study to show the Thatcher illusion as a function of the observer's species (humans and macaques), the stimulus' species (humans and macaques) and the level of perceptual expertise (novice, expert).
KW - Face recognition
KW - Holistic perception
KW - Monkey
KW - Thatcher illusion
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=77956918695&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=77956918695&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1098/rspb.2010.0438
DO - 10.1098/rspb.2010.0438
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:77956918695
SN - 0962-8452
VL - 277
SP - 2973
EP - 2981
JO - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
JF - Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
IS - 1696
ER -