Crowding

For the medical sociology concept, see Overcrowding.

Crowding is a perceptual phenomenon where the recognition of objects (or graphemes) presented away from the fovea is impaired by the presence of other neighbouring objects (sometimes called "flankers").[1] It has been suggested that crowding occurs due to mandatory integration of the crowded objects by a texture-processing neural mechanism.[2]

Crowding deficits have been specifically found in neuropsychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia and autism and may have profound clinical implications in these disorders.[3]

If objects remain within your visual field over time, then priming (psychology) begins to occur and the objects become less cluttered. [4]

References

  1. ↑ Levi D (February 2008). "Crowding - an essential bottleneck for object recognition: a mini-review". Vision Research 48 (5): 635–654. doi:10.1016/j.visres.2007.12.009.
  2. ↑ Parkes L, Lund J, Angelucci A, Solomon JA & Morgan M (2001). "Compulsory averaging of crowded orientation signals in human vision". Nature Neuroscience 4 (7): 739–744. doi:10.1038/89532.
  3. ↑ Kraehenmann, Rainer; Vollenweider FX; Seifritz E; Kometer M (2012). "Crowding deficits in the visual periphery of schizophrenia patients". PLOS ONE 7 (9): e45884. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0045884. PMC 3458825. PMID 23049884.
  4. ↑ Kristjánsson, A., Heimisson, P., Róbertsson, G., & Whitney, D. (2013). Attentional priming releases crowding. Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics, 75(7), pp. 1323-1329. Retrieved March 26, 2014, from the PsycINFO database.