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Related Experiment Videos

The body-inversion effect.

Catherine L Reed1, Valerie E Stone, Senia Bozova

  • 1Department of Psychology, University of Denver, CO 80208, USA. creed@du.edu

Psychological Science
|June 17, 2003
PubMed
Summary
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Human body posture recognition is impaired by inversion, similar to faces. This suggests body positions, like faces, are processed using configural information by untrained viewers.

Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Human Perception
  • Visual Neuroscience

Background:

  • Facial recognition is thought to rely on the configuration of facial parts.
  • The face-inversion effect demonstrates impaired recognition of inverted faces compared to upright faces.
  • Previously, the face-inversion effect was primarily observed only for faces in untrained individuals.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate if the face-inversion effect extends to the recognition of human body positions.
  • To determine if structural similarity influences the inversion effect.
  • To compare the configural processing of faces, houses, and body postures.

Main Methods:

  • Three experiments utilized a forced-choice, same/different paradigm.
  • Recognition of upright and inverted faces, houses, and body positions was compared.

Related Experiment Videos

  • Reaction time and error rates were analyzed for inversion effects.

    • Main Results:

    • Inversion significantly impaired the recognition of possible human body postures more than houses.
    • The effect of inversion on body posture recognition was comparable to that of facial recognition.
    • The inversion effect was reduced for impossible body positions that were biomechanically implausible.

    Conclusions:

    • Human body positions, similar to faces, appear to be processed using configural information by untrained viewers.
    • The findings support the hypothesis that configural processing is a key mechanism in recognizing human body postures.
    • Structural similarity and biomechanical plausibility influence the degree of the inversion effect.