Dynamics of snakes and ladders

Abstract

D. J. Field, A. Hayes, and R. F. Hess (1993) introduced two types of stimulus to study the perceptual integration of contours. Both types of stimulus consist of a smooth path of spatially separate elements, embedded in a field of randomly oriented elements. In one type of stimulus ("snakes"), the elements form tangents to the path of the contour; in the other type ("ladders"), the elements are orthogonal to the path. Little is currently known about the relative integration speeds of these two types of contour. We investigated this issue by temporally modulating the orientations of the contour elements. Our results suggest that snakes and ladders are integrated at similar speeds.