People are prone to visual illusions.

Psychology’s research on visual illusion reflects

visual preeminence among our senses. Visual capture explains the phenomenon for
which to dominate other senses. For example when watching film of a roller coaster
ride, many will “brace” themselves ever if they aren’t moving. In a sense, vision
captures other senses.

The gateway arch of St. Louis is a man made visual illusion that typically appears
taller than its width. This visual illusion can be explained b y relative height. A
monocular cue that is used in depth perception that can explain this illusion.
Monocular cues are defined as distance cues that are available to either eye alone.
Depth perception of humans can be defined as the ability to see objects in three
dimensions and retinal images provide us with the ability to judge distance. We
have both binocular and monocular cues. Binocular cues are depth cues such as
retinal disparity and convergence that depend on the use of both eyes.

To explain the illusion of the gateway arch, relative height states that we view
objects higher in our field of vision as farther away because we perceive the lower
part of a figure ground illustration as closer. Our figure ground perception is defined
as the organization of individual objects that stand out from their backgrounds.

In the scenario with the moon, it can be explained by the monocular cues and the
distance relationships. The monocular cue that could explain the moon’s illusion is
relative size. Relative size states that if we assume that two objects are similar in
size, we perceive the one that casts the smaller retinal image as farther away.
However it is common knowledge that that the moon is always the same size.
Perceptual constancy is the ability to perceive objects as unchanging even as
illumination and retinal images change. Sometimes objects shape seems to change
as with the angel of our view. Shape constancy is the fact that we perceive the form
of familiar objects as constant even familiar objects as constant even when our
retinal image changes. Size constancy helps humans perceive objects as having a
constant size even while our distance from them changes. The size distance
relationship is interplay between perceived sizes between distances. The moon
looks 50 percent larger than when high in the sky. One reason the illusion that cues
to the objects is distances at the horizon make the moon behind them seem farther
away than the moon high in the sky than the moon high in the sky. If we take away
the distance cues then the moon’s shape immediately shrinks. The similarity
between this illusion and the gateway arch is that both illusions deal with distance
and height. Relative height may contribute to the illusion that vertical dimensions
are longer than identical horizontal dimensions. The size distance relationship works
with the monocular cues and together, supplements an explanation that deals with
perception and perceptual constancy to explain the visual illusions one sees.