Introduction to Visual

Illusions
Gordon Redding: Author

An experiment was done to determine how subjects

respond to visual stimuli (in this case, line drawings) that
produce visual illusions (Müller-Lyer illusions). Before
examining the details of the experiment, it is important to
understand some of the basics about illusions.

Visual systems are typically adapted to the physical

regularities in their environment. This is true whether it is a
natural system (like humans) or an artificial system (like
robots). The system must take account of the laws of
physics, for example, or they will fail to acquire accurate
information from the light that reflects off of objects. If
one is to build a seeing machine (see "Building .. "), one
must provide the machine with information about physical
regularities (laws and assumptions), information that the
machine can use to interpret incoming information from
the surrounding world in an unambiguous manner (see
"Intro to Vision"). However, because assumptions are not
laws, they can sometimes produce perception which does
not correspond to what is present in the world (an
illusion).

Illusions
For example, a basic assumption that seems to be built
into our visual system is that the objects that we see are
from a three-dimensional world. So, if we are presented
with a two-dimensional drawing, our visual system tends
to interpret the image as if it were caused by three-
dimensional objects. Look at the picture to the left. It
appears that the three men in the picture are roughly the
same height, right? We make that judgment even though
the drawing of the man at the back of the picture is much
smaller than the drawing of the man at the front of the
picture. The drawing was made to conform to the physical
laws of projective geometry (i.e., the size of the objects in
the picture vary inversely with the distance portrayed in
the scene). The further away you want the object to
appear, the smaller the image must be. If we were to build
a machine that could correctly analyze three-dimensional
scenes, it would need to be programmed with the laws of
projective geometry, taking into account the fact that
objects that are further away will project a smaller image.

Next, let's consider a picture that violates the laws of

projective geometry (that is, the size of the objects in the
picture do not change with the portrayed distance). When
we look at that picture, the three men pictured do not
appear to be the same size. The man furthest down the
road appears to be much taller than the man in front. But,
if you were to use a ruler, you could confirm that the three
figures are exactly the same size. So this is an illusion.
Things appear differently than they really are. Of course it
is good that we are susceptable to this illusion. It results
because our visual system has been adapted for use in a
three-dimensional (not a two-dimensional) world. This
assumption -- that images projected onto our retina are
reflected off of a three-dimensional world (and thus
subject to the laws of projective geometry) -- is built into
our visual system. If we are to build a machine that is
designed to recognize objects in a three-dimensional
world, then it too must have the same assumptions built
into its visual system that we have built into ours. If it
does, then the machine will be subject to the same illusion
and it will determine that the men in the picture above are
not the same size. The machine will judge that the further
an object is perceived to be from the viewer, the smaller
the image it will project, because this is how light reflected
off of a three-dimensional world behaves.

Illusions, then, are especially important in the study of

vision, because they provide dramatic clues concerning
the underlying assumptions that are built into our visual
systems. Many "size" illusions can be explained in this
way (Gregory, 1968) as arising from the assumptions that
normally constrain processing to produce accurate (or
veridical) perceptions of the real world.

The Müller-Lyer illusion

The Müller-Lyer illusion is one of the oldest geometric

illusions (Müller-Lyer, 1889/1981). Lines with arrow
junctions attached to the ends are perceived as shorter
and lines with attached fork junctions are perceived as
longer, compared to plain lines without junctions.

One hypothesis (Redding, 2000; Redding & Hawley, 1993)

is that the size illusion is the result of our interpreting the
line drawings as representations of three-dimensional
corners. This is called the linear perspective hypothesis
because it postulates that our visual system interprets the
lines as a linear perspective drawing, which is a drawing
that produces the impression of depth by projecting a
three-dimensional scene onto a two-dimensional picture
plane. When we view such a drawing our visual system
attempts to solve the inverse problem by recovering the
three-dimensional scene that would typically produce
two-dimensional images of this kind (Kubovy, 1986).

The Linear-Perspective Hypothesis The linear-

perspective hypothesis assumes that the Müller-Lyer
arrow and fork junction stimuli are interpreted by the
visual system as linear perspective drawings depicting
right-angled corners either projecting toward the viewer
and in front of the picture plane (a convex corner) or
projecting away from the viewer and behind the picture
plane (a concave corner). We call a three-dimensional
corner that is represented by a two-dimensional drawing,
a "virtual" corner (because it isn't a real corner, it only
looks like one).
 (click twice)

The image above shows the corner of a building

projecting towards the viewer with the walls on either side
receding away from the viewer. If the corner of the
building is perceived to be projecting in front of the
picture plane, then the line representing the corner will be
perceived as being closer to the viewer and thus shorter
than a simple straight line located in the picture plane
(remember the law of projective geometry).

Conversely, the image on the left shows the corner of a

building that projects to the back of the picture plane with
the walls on either side coming toward the viewer. If the
corner of the building is perceived to be projecting behind
the picture plane, then the line representing the corner will
be perceived as being further from the viewer and thus
longer than a simple straight line located in the picture
plane.
(click twice)
In other words, if the corner of the building (i.e., the virtual
corner) is receding into the distance, then that tells the
visual system that it is further away and thus that it is
really taller than the image it projects. That's why it is
judged to be longer than a single line without fork
junctions. If, on the other hand, the corner of the building
is projecting out towards the viewer, then that tells the
visual system that the corner line is very close to the
viewer and thus it is judged to be shorter than a single line
without the arrow junctions. Of course, the size of the
two-dimensional drawing (what is called "the picture
plane size") also influences perception and the illusion is
never as large as the difference in virtual corner sizes
would predict.

Hypothesis testing

The linear perspective hypothesis makes sense, but is it a

good explanation of the illusion? One way of testing the
hypothesis is to derive from it predictions about how the
illusion should change in other conditions not yet
observed.

For example, if we mathematically rotate the virtual

corners about the vertical axis in the picture plane, the
corner size must also be changed to keep the same size in
the drawing because the corners move closer to the
picture plane. The rotated convex corner must be made
larger and the rotated concave corner must be made
smaller. This means that the illusions should decrease.
Just this result has been found when drawings of rotated
corners are presented to people for their judgment of size.
The effect is small, but detectable (Redding, 2000).

Experimental tests of this kind can provide some evidence

in support of a hypothesis (like the linear pespective
hypothesis), but an hypothesis can never be "proved"
because other explanations always remain possible (see
"Methods for Studying Perception"). For example, there is
a competing theory to explain the results of the
experiments just described. The drawings of rotated
corners have asymmetrical junctions (i.e, the junctions
coming off the left side of the vertical line are not mirror
images of the junctions coming off the right side of the
line). It has been suggested that this asymmetry might
itself be responsible for the decreased illusion. So how do
you decide which theory to accept?

One of the best ways to look at data from experimental

subjects who have responded to visual information that
may be relevant to this question. Let's examine how the
experiment was designed and why it might (or might not)
provide support for the truth of the linear perspective
hypothesis.

Analysis of the Müeller Lyer Experiment