Until recently, the transformational approach provided the only available formal analysis of visual regularities like repetition and mirror symmetry. This theoretical study presents a new analysis, based on the recently developed concept of holographic regularity. This concept applies to the intrinsic character of regularity and specifies the unique formal status of perceptually relevant regularities. The crucial point is that the two analyses imply the same structure for repetition but a different structure for mirror symmetry. Transformationally, mirror symmetry is an all-or-nothing property, whereas holographically, it is a graded property. This difference pervades the understanding of both perfect regularities and perturbed regularities. Whereas the transformational approach explains hardly any goodness phenomenon, the holographic approach explains a wide variety of goodness phenomena in a coherent way that is ecologically plausible as well.

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The phenomenon of visual occlusion has frequently been studied by means of twodimensional line drawings. These drawings may elicit various interpretations. Sometimes a mosaic of shapes is seen, sometimes a shape that partly occludes another shape. In the latter case, observers often have a clear idea about the form of the partly occluded shape. Local and global pattern aspects both seem to be decisive with respect to the preferred interpretation. An attempt is made to integrate these aspects by applying the global-minimum principle to the perceptual complexity of three distinct components of those pattern interpretations: (i) The internal structure, dealing with each of the shapes separately, (ii) the external structure, dealing with the positional relation between these shapes, and (iii) the virtual structure, dealing with the occluded parts of the shapes. The perceptual complexity of each of these three components can be expressed in terms of structural information. The hypothesis that the perceptually preferred interpretation is the one for which the total information load is minimal is tested on many patterns stemming from different studies on pattern completion.

In visual occlusion 2 amodal-completion tendencies occur frequently. One tendency leads toward the simplest completed shape (a global completion) and the other to a shape for which the completion itself is as simple as possible (a local completion). Two experimental paradigms were used to test the strengths of these completion tendencies: a drawing task and a simultaneous matching task. The experimental results support the notion that the preference for either a global or a local completion is the consequence of a competition between interpretations. Finally, the authors discuss how the preference for a completion can be predicted by a model that is based on a quantification of both global and local aspects.

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