Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture.
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
Old woman or young woman?
Look at this picture for 3 seconds
then draw it from memory
A vase or two faces?
Visual Perception
• The question
• Is the world OUT THERE to be seen?
Bottom Up perception (Gibson)
• If perception is innate
Then we draw the world as it is
Visual Perception
• Do we construct the world that we see?
• Top Down perception (Gregory)
• If perception is learned
Then we draw what we THINK we see
and what we think we see has been
learned
Top Down visual perception?
• The ‘switch’ you see is evidence for
GREGORY
IS the left vertical really shorter?
And what on earth is this?
And think about this…….
The red squares ARE the same colour and size
So why do they look different?
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• The question
• Does culture affect the way we SEE
pictures (nurture)
• Cross cultural studies can help to
answer this question
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• The method
• DEREGOWSKI performed a review of
a series of
CROSS CULTURAL STUDIES
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (1) late 19th century
• Robert Laws & Mrs Donald Frazer
– they were missionaries
• showed Africans ‘European style’
Pictures (e.g. of elephants)
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
The Africans were afraid of them….. they
thought they were real elephants
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (2) William Hudson
• “the key to understanding
pictures lies in depth cues”
• WE LEARN three rules
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• DEPTH CUES - Rule ONE
• larger objects are perceived as nearer
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• DEPTH CUES - Rule TWO
• overlap - obscured objects seen as
further away
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• DEPTH CUES - Rule THREE
• perspective - lines converge as they
get further away (railway lines)
William Hudson’s famous picture
Spearing the antelope or the elephant?
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Showed this picture to Africans
• when asked “what is the man doing”
participants could not say which animal was
‘being speared’
• (did not seem to use depth cues)
• classed as two dimensional viewers
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (3) William Hudson
• Zambian children - shown picture of two
squares connected by a ‘rod’
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (3) William Hudson
• Given sticks and modelling clay to ‘build
a model’ of what they saw
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (3) William Hudson
• 2-D viewers built two dimensional
models
British primary
school children
usually try to build
3 dimensional
models (boxes)
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (4) The impossible trident
• Zambian primary school children asked
to draw this figure
• 2-D viewers found it easiest!
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (4) The impossible trident
• 3-D viewers found it harder - they spent
longer looking at it (Why?)
Are you a 2-D or a 3-D viewer
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (5) Richard GREGORY
• asked unskilled African viewers to
adjust a spot of light so that it
lay at the same depth as an object in
the
• ‘spearing the antelope picture’
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (5) example - try this out
Where will the
pointer be if it
is on the
nearest object?
2-D viewers
cannot do this
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Study (6) split style drawing
African children
prefer the split style
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• The cross cultural studies
• What can we conclude?
• If different cultures use different rules to
construct their pictures it follows that
one culture may not be able to interpret
the drawings of another culture
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Do YOU understand these symbols?
what do they mean?
Would they be universally understood?
(by all cultures)
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
What do you see? Duck or rabbit?
Evidence for Gregory or Gibson?
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• Remember the question !!
• Is the world OUT THERE to be seen? Bottom
Up perception
• (Gibson=nature)
• Do we construct the world that we see? Top
Down perception
• (Gregory=nurture)
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
• As you view this is your brain
testing a hypothesis?
Deregowski (1972)
Pictorial perception and culture
The end
