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. 2025 Sep 16;18(5):43.
doi: 10.3390/jemr18050043. eCollection 2025 Oct.

Entropy as a Lens: Exploring Visual Behavior Patterns in Architects

Renate Delucchi Danhier  1 , Barbara Mertins  1 , Holger Mertins  2 , Gerold Schneider  3
Affiliations

Entropy as a Lens: Exploring Visual Behavior Patterns in Architects

Renate Delucchi Danhier et al. J Eye Mov Res. .

Abstract

This study examines how architectural expertise shapes visual perception, extending the "Seeing for Speaking" hypothesis into a non-linguistic domain. Specifically, it investigates whether architectural training influences unconscious visual processing of architectural content. Using eye-tracking, 48 architects and 48 laypeople freely viewed 15 still images of built, mixed, and natural environments. Visual behavior was analyzed using Shannon's entropy scores based on dwell times within 16 × 16 grids during the first six seconds of viewing. Results revealed distinct visual attention patterns between groups. Architects showed lower entropy, indicating more focused and systematic gaze behavior, and their attention was consistently drawn to built structures. In contrast, laypeople exhibited more variable and less organized scanning patterns, with greater individual differences. Moreover, architects demonstrated higher intra-group similarity in their gaze behavior, suggesting a shared attentional schema shaped by professional training. These findings highlight that domain-specific expertise deeply influences perceptual processing, resulting in systematic and efficient attention allocation. Entropy-based metrics proved effective in capturing these differences, offering a robust tool for quantifying expert vs. non-expert visual strategies in architectural cognition. The visual patterns exhibited by architects are interpreted to reflect a "Grammar of Space", i.e., a structured way of visually parsing spatial elements.

Keywords: architecture; entropy; experts; eye-tracking; visual.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of InterestR.D.D, B.M., and G.S. declare no conflicts of interest. H.M. is employee of KRESINGS Architektur Münster GmbH. The company had no role in the design of the study, in the collection or analyses of the data, in the original draft preparation, or in the decision to publish the results.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
All 15 stimuli used in the study, grouped by category (Built, Mixed, Natural) based on the density of built elements.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Overview of the experimental design.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Gridded AOIs (16 × 16) overlaid on stimulus M2, resulting in 256 AOIs of equal size.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Overall trend. Comparison between groups for all participants and all stimuli.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Dwell time densities for each of the 15 stimuli arranged as small multiples.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Distribution of dwell time for all built environment stimuli.
Figure 7
Figure 7
(a) Stimulus B1 “St. Louis”; (b) the distribution of dwell times; (c,d) heat maps for both groups while viewing the stimulus.
Figure 8
Figure 8
(a) Stimulus M2 “Scotland”; (b) the distribution of dwell times; (c,d) heat maps for both groups while viewing the stimulus.
Figure 9
Figure 9
(a) Stimulus N2 “Canada”; (b) the distribution of dwell times; (c,d) heat maps for each group while viewing the stimulus.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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