Directional Preferences in Perception of Visual Stimuli

Abstract

The present paper reviews a series of studies regarding the effects of hemispheric asymmetry and reading and writing habits on directional preferences in reproducing horizontally-displayed visual stimuli. Hebrew readers, English readers, and Arabic readers were presented with arrays of horizontally-displayed directional and nondirectional stimuli, as well as with single stimuli. They were asked to reproduce the stimuli, and the direction of their reproduction, left-right or right-left, was recorded for analysis. Generally, in reproducing arrays of stimuli, English readers showed left-right directionality, whereas Hebrew readers showed right-left directionality. But in reproducing arrays of English and Hebrew letters, subjects of both groups showed left-right and right-left preferences, respectively. However, the right-left directional preferences shown by Hebrew readers were weaker than the left-right preferences shown by English readers. It was hypothesized that these differences are due to differential reading and writing habits acquired in school by English- and Hebrew-readers. In support of the reading and writing habit hypothesis, it was subsequently found that: (a) Arabic readers, who have stronger right-left reading and writing habits than Hebrew readers, show relatively stronger right-left directional preferences, and (b) with the introduction of English as a foreign language in the fifth grade, children show an increase in left-right directionality. Further investigation showed that, depending on the experimental conditions, directional preferences may be a function of either reading and writing habits, or hemispheric asymmetry, or both. Finally, the bearing of these findings on the "nature-nurture" controversy regarding the development of perceptual exploration in children is discussed.

Left dominance for language perception starts in the extrastriate cortex: An ERP and sLORETA study

“…In a first step, data transformation from Brain Vision Analyser to sLORETA software was performed, using a protocol by Mückschel et al [45]. Using the sLORETA software, we then performed voxel-wise randomisation tests with 5000 permutations, based on statistical non-parametric mapping (SnPM).…”

Visualizing Thought

“…Temporal order of events is gestured left to right in native Spanish speakers but right to left in native Arabic speakers, even when speaking Spanish (e.g., Santiago, Lupiáñez, Pérez, & Funes, 2007). Writing order affects perception of motion (e.g., Maass, Pagani, & Berta, 2007;Morikawa & McBeath, 1992), perceptual exploration and drawing (e.g., Chokron & De Agostini, 2000;Nachshon, 1985;Vaid, Singh, Sakhuja, & Gupta, 2002), aesthetic judgments (e.g., Chokron & De Agostini, 2000;Nachshon, Argaman, & Luria, 1999), emotion judgments (Sakhuja, Gupta, Singh, and Vaid, 1996), judgments of agency, power, and speed (Chatterjee, 2001(Chatterjee, , 2002Hegarty, Lemieux, & McQueen, in press;Maass & Russo, 2003;Suitner & Maass, 2007), and art (Chatterjee, 2001;McManus & Humphrey, 1973). A variety of factors correlated with reading order seem to underlie these effects.…”

Groups in space: Stereotypes and the spatial agency bias

“…However, cross-cultural research has often found total, or at least partial, reversals in cultures where languages are written from right to left (RL), such as Arabic, Hebrew, or Urdu, suggesting that language-related scanning habits play an important role in such spatial asymmetries. Indeed, reversals have been reported in many different areas of psychology and on different tasks, including inhibition of return (Spalek & Hammad, 2004), representational momentum (McBeath, Morikava, & Kaiser, 1992), imaginary number line (Dehaene, Bossini, & Giraux, 1993), visual imaging of subject-verb-object sentences (Maass & Russo, 2003), and drawing, exploration of art, and aesthetic preferences (e.g., Chokron & De Agostini, 2000;Nachshon, 1985;Nachshon, Argaman, & Luria, 1999;Tversky, Kugelmass, & Winter, 1991). Some studies also suggest that culture-specific asymmetries in space perception and directional tendencies only occur after learning to read and to write, as in the case of Fagard and Dahamen's (2003) study comparing French and Tunisian children, suggesting that writing/reading habits are implicated in spatial bias.…”