Monday, September 12, 2011

Reaction: Attention and Visual Memory in Visualization and Computer Graphics

The paper starts by describing preattentive processing and the different theories which attempt to explain the different observations. The different theories discussed include Feature Integration theory, Textron theory, Similarity theory, Guided search theory, Boolean Map theory. There is a constant to and fro between serial and parallel processing ideas. The theories evolve to explain the new observations and examples. Discussions on feature hierarchy and ensemble coding bring out very important basic concepts which help in making better visualizations.

The next part of the paper describes concepts about visual expectation and memory. Change blindness and postattentive amnesia are interesting concepts which can affect how we design a visualization. At the end of the paper the author has summarized how these concepts apply to visualizations. This paper seemed like a valuable resource to understand how human perception works and how it affects the field of visualization.


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