Helmholtz illusion on clothing revisited H Ashida, K Kuraguchi, K Miyoshi |
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Graduate School of Letters, Kyoto University, Japan
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| A square filled with horizontal stripes is perceived as thinner and taller than one with vertical stripes (Helmholtz illusion). This is counterintuitive given the common belief that horizontal stripes make us look fatter. Thompson and Mikellidou [2011, i-Perception, 2, 69-76] confirmed the Helmholtz effect, but the reason for the discrepancy is not fully understood. In this study, we measured the point of subjective equality (PSE) in the perceived body width by pairwise comparison of female figures with horizontal and vertical stripes. The results highlighted three factors that might underlie the discrepancy. First, the Helmholtz effect is more pronounced for a thin figure than for a fat one, with possible reversal for the latter. Second, the PSE was diverse across participants, ranging from positive to negative values for both fat and thin figures. Third, there was a strong effect of block order; whether the participants were tested with a fat or thin figure first, the results in the second block became closer to those in the first block. We conclude that the effect of striped clothing on perceived body shape is essentially complex, depending on many factors such as fitness of the person and surrounding people, and possibly on watchers’ attitudes. |
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