No Vergence Size Constancy

Abstract

Abstract Vergence (the angular rotation of the eyes) is thought to provide essential distance information for size constancy (perceiving an object as having a constant physical size). Evidence for this comes from the fact that a target with a constant retinal size appears to shrink as the rotation of the eyes increases (indicating that the target has reduced in distance). This reduction in perceived size is supposed to maintain a constant perception of physical size in natural viewing conditions by cancelling out the increasing size of the retinal image as an object moves closer. Whilst this hypothesis has been extensively tested over the last 200 years, it has always been tested in the presence of confounding cues such as a changing retinal image or cognitive cues to distance. Testing members of the public with normal vision, we control for these confounding cues and find no evidence of vergence size constancy. Statement of Relevance This work has important implications for the neural basis of size constancy and for multisensory integration. First, leading work on the neural basis of size constancy cannot differentiate between recurrent processes in V1 (based on triangulation cues, such as vergence) and top-down processing (based on pictorial cues). Since our work challenges the existence of vergence size constancy, and therefore much of the basis of the recurrent processing account, our work indicates that top-down processing is likely to have a much more important role in size constancy than previously thought. Second, vergence size constancy is thought to be largely responsible for the apparent integration of the retinal image with proprioceptive distance information from the hand in the Taylor illusion (an afterimage of the hand viewed in darkness appears to shrink as the observer’s hand is moved closer). This explanation for the Taylor illusion is challenged, and a cognitive account proposed instead.