Overestimation in Size-Constancy Judgments

Development of size constancy in children: A test of the proximal mode sensitivity hypothesis

“…For example, overconstancy is often exhibited by adults (see, e.g., Carlson, 1960;Epstein, 1963;Gilinsky, 1955) and 9-to 10-year-old children (Granrud, 2004) when they estimate the size of a distant object (see also Figure 2). In addition, varying instructions result in widely varying size estimates in adults (see, e.g., Carlson, 1960;Epstein, 1963;Gilinsky, 1955) and older children, but not in younger children (see, e.g., Granrud, 2004;Rapoport, 1967). These findings are consistent with the cognitive supplementation hypothesis but cannot be explained by the perceptual learning hypothesis.…”

Relative distance judgments of familiar and unfamiliar objects viewed under representatively natural conditions

“…Carlson and Tassone's (1971) hypothesis that familiar size has the perceptual effect of increasing perceived distance is consistent with most of the present findings and, in particular, with the dependency of the effect on viewing distance and its occurrence with two different measures of perceived relative distance. In conjunction with the perspective attitude (Carlson, 1960(Carlson, , 1977-that is, the widely held belief that if two objects are judged to be equal in size, the more distantly appearing one will be reported to look smaller-their hypothesis also accounts for the tendency to report the familiar object as smaller in apparent size and either equal or taller in objective size. According to Carlson and Tassone (1971), if the instructions successfully distinguish between objective and apparent size, then "If S assumes that the two objects are equal in objective size, he will judge the more distant-appearing one to be smaller in apparent size; if he assumes that the two are equal in apparent size, he will judge the more distant-appearing one to be larger in objective size" (p. 110).…”

Visual Processing of Object Velocity and Acceleration

“…In one of the most interesting of these studies, Gilinsky (1955) found that observers were able to match either the retinal or the objective size of the test object, depending on the instructions given by the experimenter. Gilinsky's results, subsequently verified in other laboratories (Carlson, 1960;1977;Leibowitz and Harvey, 1969), indicate that matching is a weak guide to the cognitive (or neural) operations underlying size constancy. One cannot determine whether the observer perceives retinal size, and then corrects this percept by some measure of depth to estimate objective size, or vice versa.…”