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ANISEIKONIA: THE ACHILLES HEEL OF THE CLASSICAL THEORY OF VISION
Author(s) -
TAYLOR JAMES G.
Publication year - 1971
Publication title -
british journal of psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.536
H-Index - 92
eISSN - 2044-8295
pISSN - 0007-1269
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1971.tb02063.x
Subject(s) - psychology , perception , eye movement , optometry , neuroscience , medicine
There are two kinds of naturally occurring aniseikonia. Parallactic aniseikonia (retinal disparity) is one‐dimensional, and it is commonly supposed to be a major factor in the genesis of the perception of depth. Asymmetric aniseikonia occurs when ocular convergence is asymmetric, so that a fixated object is nearer to one eye than to the other, and it is two‐dimensional. It has fatal implications for any theory based on the assumption that visual perception is fully determined by events in the visual system, from the retina to the striate area, and consequently is seldom mentioned in the literature. It has no such implications for the behavioural theory of perception (Taylor, 1962), which fully explains two perceptual constancies that persist through a wide range of variation in aniseikonia. The behavioural theory offers a simple explanation of the delay in the development of perceptual distortion when aniseikonia is produced artificially by means of a lens.