Vision science

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Vision science is the scientific study of visual perception. Researchers in vision science can be called vision scientists, especially if their research spans some of the science's many disciplines.

Contents

Vision science encompasses all studies of vision, such as how human and non-human organisms process visual information, how conscious visual perception works in humans, how to exploit visual perception for effective communication, and how artificial systems can do the same tasks. Vision science overlaps with or encompasses disciplines such as ophthalmology and optometry, neuroscience(s), psychology (particularly sensation and perception psychology, cognitive psychology, linguistics, biopsychology, psychophysics, and neuropsychology), physics (particularly optics), ethology, and computer science (particularly computer vision, artificial intelligence, and computer graphics), as well as other engineering related areas such as data visualization, user interface design, and human factors and ergonomics. Below is a list of pertinent journals and international conferences.

Journals

Scientific journals exclusively or predominantly concerned with vision science include:

Conferences

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Myopia</span> Problem with distance vision

Myopia, also known as near-sightedness and short-sightedness, is an eye disease where light from distant objects focuses in front of, instead of on, the retina. As a result, distant objects appear blurry while close objects appear normal. Other symptoms may include headaches and eye strain. Severe myopia is associated with an increased risk of macular degeneration, retinal detachment, cataracts, and glaucoma.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Optometry</span> Field of medicine treating eye disorders

Optometry is a specialized health care profession that involves examining the eyes and related structures for defects or abnormalities. Optometrists are health care professionals who typically provide comprehensive eye care.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peripheral vision</span> Area of ones field of vision outside of the point of fixation

Peripheral vision, or indirect vision, is vision as it occurs outside the point of fixation, i.e. away from the center of gaze or, when viewed at large angles, in the "corner of one's eye". The vast majority of the area in the visual field is included in the notion of peripheral vision. "Far peripheral" vision refers to the area at the edges of the visual field, "mid-peripheral" vision refers to medium eccentricities, and "near-peripheral", sometimes referred to as "para-central" vision, exists adjacent to the center of gaze.

Ocular dominance, sometimes called eye preference or eyedness, is the tendency to prefer visual input from one eye to the other. It is somewhat analogous to the laterality of right- or left-handedness; however, the side of the dominant eye and the dominant hand do not always match. This is because both hemispheres control both eyes, but each one takes charge of a different half of the field of vision, and therefore a different half of both retinas. There is thus no direct analogy between "handedness" and "eyedness" as lateral phenomena.

Vision therapy (VT), or behavioral optometry, is an umbrella term for alternative medicine treatments using eye exercises, based around the pseudoscientific claim that vision problems are the true underlying cause of learning difficulties, particularly in children. Vision therapy has not been shown to be effective using scientific studies, except for helping with convergence insufficiency. Most claims—for example that the therapy can address neurological, educational, and spatial difficulties—lack supporting evidence. Neither the American Academy of Pediatrics nor the American Academy of Ophthalmology support the use of vision therapy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Astigmatism</span> Type of eye defect

Astigmatism is a type of refractive error due to rotational asymmetry in the eye's refractive power. This results in distorted or blurred vision at any distance. Other symptoms can include eyestrain, headaches, and trouble driving at night. Astigmatism often occurs at birth and can change or develop later in life. If it occurs in early life and is left untreated, it may result in amblyopia.

Marlene Behrmann is a Professor in the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of Pittsburgh. She was previously a Professor of Psychology at Carnegie Mellon University. She specializes in the cognitive neuroscience of visual perception, with a specific focus on object recognition.

Visual perception is the ability to interpret the surrounding environment through photopic vision, color vision, scotopic vision, and mesopic vision, using light in the visible spectrum reflected by objects in the environment. This is different from visual acuity, which refers to how clearly a person sees. A person can have problems with visual perceptual processing even if they have 20/20 vision.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stanley A. Klein</span>

Stanley A. Klein is an American psychophysicist. He is Professor of Vision Science and Optometry at the University of California, Berkeley and a member of the Berkeley Visual Processing Laboratory. He was a consulting editor for Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics, a publication of the Psychonomic Society which promotes the communication of scientific research in psychology and allied sciences. His major area of research has been neurotechnology, a field of science that studies the body and mind through the nervous system by electronics and mechanisms. He was the co-chair for the SPIE meetings on human vision. Klein has authored and co-authored numerous papers on visual perception in the human brain. He is currently interested in the intersection of religion and science.

Some of the research that is conducted in the field of psychology is more "fundamental" than the research conducted in the applied psychological disciplines, and does not necessarily have a direct application. The subdisciplines within psychology that can be thought to reflect a basic-science orientation include biological psychology, cognitive psychology, neuropsychology, and so on. Research in these subdisciplines is characterized by methodological rigor. The concern of psychology as a basic science is in understanding the laws and processes that underlie behavior, cognition, and emotion. Psychology as a basic science provides a foundation for applied psychology. Applied psychology, by contrast, involves the application of psychological principles and theories yielded up by the basic psychological sciences; these applications are aimed at overcoming problems or promoting well-being in areas such as mental and physical health and education.

Vision of humans and other organisms depends on several organs such as the lens of the eye, and any vision correcting devices, which use optics to focus the image.

Jocelyn Faubert is a Canadian psychophysicist best known for his work in the fields of visual perception, vision of the elderly, and neuropsychology. Faubert holds the NSERC-Essilor Industrial Research Chair in Visual Perception and Presbyopia. He is the director of the Laboratory of Psychophysics and Visual Perception at the University of Montreal. Faubert has also been involved in the transfer of research and developments from the laboratory into the commercial domain. He is a co-founder and member of the Board of Directors of CogniSens Inc.

Scholar, educator, and philanthropist Herschel Leibowitz is widely recognized for his research in visual perception and for his symbiotic approach to conducting research that both advanced theory and helped in the understanding and relief of societal problems. His research on transportation safety included studies of nearsightedness during night driving, vision during civil twilight, an illusion that underlies the behavior of motorists involved in auto-train collisions, susceptibility of pilots to illusions caused by visual-vestibular interactions, and the design of aircraft instrument panels.

Tom Norman Cornsweet was an American experimental psychologist known for his pioneering work in visual perception, especially the effect that bears his name, and in the development of ophthalmic instrumentation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin J. Steinbach</span>

Martin Jeffrey Steinbach was an American vision researcher who spent most of his career in Canada. He was Distinguished Research Professor Emeritus in the Department of Psychology at York University. He received a master's degree from Connecticut College in 1965 and a Ph.D. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1968.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Konrad Pesudovs</span>

Konrad Pesudovs is an Australian optometrist and outcomes researcher in ophthalmology; recognised as the leading optometrist researcher worldwide in terms of H-Index and total citations. He is SHARP Professor of Optometry and Vision Science at the University of New South Wales (2020-). He was the Foundation Chair of Optometry and Vision Science at Flinders University from 2009 to 2017.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Davida Teller</span> American psychologist

Davida Young Teller was a professor in the Departments of Psychology and Physiology/Biophysics at the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington. She was a leader in the scientific study of infant visual development.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Russell L. De Valois</span>

Russell L. De Valois was an American scientist recognized for his pioneering research on spatial and color vision.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Louise L. Sloan</span> Vision scientist (1898-1982)

Louise Littig Sloan was an American ophthalmologist and vision scientist. She is credited for being a pioneer of the sub-division of clinical vision research, contributing more than 100 scientific articles in which she either authored or co-authored. Her most notable work was in the area of visual acuity testing where she developed and improved equipment. Sloan received her Ph.D. from Bryn Mawr College in experimental psychology. She spent a short period of time in both Bryn Mawr's experimental psychology program as well as the Department of Ophthalmology at Harvard Medical School. The majority of her career, however, was spent at Johns Hopkins Wilmer Eye Institute where she directed the Wilmer Laboratory of Physiological Optics for 44 years. In 1971, Sloan was the second woman awarded the prestigious Edgar D. Tillyer Award by Optica (formerly Optical Society for her many achievements in the field of vision.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John S. Werner</span> Human vision research scientist

John S. Werner is an American scientist who studies human vision and its changes across the life span. He is a Distinguished Professor at the University of California, Davis in the Department of Ophthalmology and Vision Science, and Department of Neurobiology, Physiology and Behavior. His work has been cited ~ 17,000 times.

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