Visual and Haptic Shape Recognition Memory

Abstract

Little is known about memory for solid (3-D) shape, especially for unfamiliar naturally-shaped objects. In the current Experiment 1, participants haptically explored or viewed a set of six bell peppers (Capsicum annuum) either once, four times, or seven times. On each study trial, the participants either viewed or haptically explored a particular bell pepper for 15 seconds. The participants’ recognition memory was tested immediately. Twelve bell peppers were then presented (visually or haptically); the participants judged whether each one was either old (previously presented during the study phase) or new. Recognition performance was similar for vision and haptics when each of the original bell peppers was studied once. However, when the original bell peppers were studied multiple times (4 or 7 times), the participants’ visual recognition performance was higher (by 33.7 percent) than that obtained for haptics. The procedure used for Experiment 2 was identical (objects were studied 4 times), except that a 10- or 20-minute delay was inserted in between the study and test sessions. There was no effect of delay upon haptic shape recognition. In contrast, a 10- or 20-minute delay produced substantial reductions in performance for visual shape recognition. Overall, visual solid shape memory was superior to haptic shape memory, especially when memory was tested immediately.

Meeting abstract presented at VSS 2015