Do first impressions count? – Influences on the perception of ambiguous pictures S Utz, C-C Carbon |
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Department of General Psychology and Methods, University of Bamberg, Germany
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| The perceptual interpretation of a visual scene is dependent on many factors, e.g. experience, pre-activated schemes and attention, leading to ambiguous interpretations [Pomplun et al, 1996, Perception, 25, 931-948]. Here we extended typical research in this respect by integrating influences of personality factors on the perception of ambiguous pictures within an eye tracking setting. Twenty-one participants examined 30 ambiguous paintings with varying complexity and responded as quickly as possible to two alternative interpretations (I1 & I2). Response times (RTs) were measured and questionnaires testing the tolerance to ambiguity (IMA) and the Big Five personality traits (BFI-K) were applied. In contrast to previous studies, participants were not informed about the interpretations of each stimulus in advance. Eye movement data revealed distinct scan paths according to the respective interpretation. RTs of both interpretations correlated negatively with openness to experience (I1: r = -.51; p = .018; I2: r = -.68; p = .001). Interestingly, the ambiguity tolerance scales did not correlate with RTs. On average, participants with a higher degree of openness to new experiences interpreted ambiguous paintings much faster than those with a lower degree. The present study reflects the utility and limits of usual experiments in the targeted domain neglecting personality factors. |
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