Abstract
The present study investigated the effect of changing room illumination on perceived afterimage duration. Subjects observed a light pulse and reported upon their perception of a resultant afterimage. This afterimage was first produced and observed in the dark and was continually viewed in this environment until it was reported to have disappeared. The room lights were then turned on, and the subjects reported if the afterimage reappeared and, if it did, on its persistence. Upon the afterimage’s disappearance in the lighted environment, the room lights were turned off and, again, subjects reported upon the afterimage. This systematic alternation between dark and light room environment continued until subjects no longer reported perceiving an afterimage. It was found that such alternation prolonged afterimage duration, with four illumination changes appearing to be the maximal number for producing the effect.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Alpern, M., & Barr, L. Durations of the afterimage of brief light flashes and the theory of the Broca and Sulzer phenomena. Journal of the Optical Society of America, 1961, 52, 219–221.
Brindley, G. S. The discrimination of afterimages. Journal of Physiology, 1959, 147, 194–203.
Brindley, G. S. Two new properties of foveal afterimages and a photochemical hypothesis to explain them. Journal of Physiology, 1962, 164, 168–179.
Brindley, G. S. Afterimages. Scientific American, 1963, 209, 84–93.
Evans, J. N. A clinical method to determine the rate of elimination of afterimages (eikonoscopy). American Journal of Ophthalmology, 1928, 11, 194–202.
Hall, R. J., & Wilsoncroft, W. E. Prolonged visual afterimages. Psychonomic Science, 1964, 1, 267–268.
Helmholtz, H. Physiological optics (Vol. 2). New York: Dover, 1962. (Translated from the 1896 edition.)
McGuinness, D., & Lewis, I. Sex differences in visual persistence: Experiments on the Ganzfeld and afterimages. Perception, 1976, 5, 279–294.
Meudell, A., & Pease, K. G. Influence of meaning on fragmentation of visual afterimages. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 1968, 27, 965–966.
Misiak, H., & Lozito, C. C. Latency and duration of monocular and binocular afterimages. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 1951, 42, 247–249.
Smith, L. D., & Wallace, B. The role of a cognitive factor in the prolongation of an induced visual afterimage. Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society, 1982, 19, 145–147.
Wallace, B. Hypnotic susceptibility and the perception of afterimages and dot stimuli. American Journal of Psychology, 1979, 92, 681–691. (a)
Wallace, B. The role of iris pigmentation in the perception of an afterimage. Perception & Psychophysics, 1979, 26, 469–471. (b)
Wallace, B., & Smith, L. D. Sclera color and reports of afterimage persistence. Perception & Psychophysics, 1981, 29, 277–279.
Williamson, W. P. Afterimage perimetry: A rapid method of obtaining visual fields; preliminary report. Archives of Ophthalmology, 1945, 33, 417–422.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Wallace, B. Prolongation of a visual afterimage with systematic alternation of room illumination. Bull. Psychon. Soc. 19, 351–352 (1982). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03330279
Received:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03330279