Role of geons in object recognition across ages

Little research has been conducted regarding the developmental implications of Biederman's 1987 Recognition by Components theory. The present study compared objects fragmented according to this theory, i.e., vertices were left intact and midsegments were deleted, with objects that were randomly fragmented. A total of 169 students from three age groups (first grade, fourth grade, and college) participated. Approximately half of the participants viewed pictures with intact vertices and half viewed the randomly fragmented pictures. Analysis showed that participants recognized more pictures across groups; however, there were no significant differences between the two sets of pictures. This finding suggests that vertices are important but are not necessary for object recognition. The role of midsegments in object recognition is also discussed.