The same neural structures involved in the unconscious modeling of our acting body in space also contribute to our awareness of the lived body and of the objects that the world contains. Neuroscientific research also shows that there are neural mechanisms mediating between the multi-level personal experience we entertain of our lived body, and the implicit certainties we simultaneously hold about others. Such personal and body-related experiential knowledge enables us to understand the actions performed by others, and to directly decode the emotions and sensations they experience. A common functional mechanism is at the basis of both body awareness and basic forms of social understanding: embodied simulation. It will be shown that the present proposal is consistent with some of the perspectives offered by phenomenology.

Embodied Simulation:From Neurons to Phenomenal Experience

It has been argued that movement can be implied by static cues of images depicting an instance of a dynamic event. Instances of implied motion have been investigated as a special type of stimulus w...

Move Still: The Effects of Implied and Real Motion on the Duration Estimates of Dance Steps:

This article illustrates the first steps of a research project concerning the “Subjective Experience and Estimation of Moving-Image Time” (SEEM_IT). After introducing the theoretical background of the research, that links time perception to the embodied experience of movement, the article presents the main empirical results of an experiment aimed at assessing how spectators’ time perception is affected by the style of editing and the type of represented action in short video clips. Though the style of editing played a major role in influencing SEEM_IT, it also significantly interacted with the type of represented action. The article reassesses these findings by discussing them within the theoretical framework of the research.

It Doesn’t Seem_It, But It Is. A Neurofilmological Approach to the Subjective Experience of Moving-Image Time

What is it like to look at a painting? Research into art-viewing raises challenging considerations. Factors concerning the artwork, the viewer, the role of context, as well as conceptualisation of the response and how to measure it, present a wealth of complexity. Although such a topic might arguably lend itself to qualitative exploration, work of this type is notably sparse. In the research reported here, Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis was used to explore the experience of looking at a painting. 12 participants were individually interviewed whilst viewing Las Meninas by Diego Velazquez. Three Master Themes were developed, the first of which ‘The Gaze’ is presented in depth. Experiences of looking and being looked at by figures in the image are described and considered in relation to social and philosophical understandings of eye contact, seeing and being seen.

/pdf/people-are-gazing-an-interpretative-phenomenological-1k95lz1sb4.pdf

“People are gazing” — An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of Viewing Velázquez


Several artists, neuroscientists, and art psychologists have investigated the existence of a relationship between perceived motion and beauty in figurative and abstract paintings. In our study, we created stimulus pictures by combining the same matrices, consisting of modular stochastic polygons, to obtain regular (translational symmetry) and irregular (non-symmetry) combinations. Some of these combinations consisted of many small matrices, making it difficult to read the ‘shapes’ of stochastic polygons. Our sample consisted of both art experts and non-art experts. We hypothesised that irregular combinations, with fewer and greater numbers of the same matrices, would have stimulated more perception of motion, complexity and beauty than regular compositions. Results showed that stochastic irregular combinations are generally dynamic, more complex, and more aesthetically pleasing than stochastic regular compositions. Perhaps the greater dynamism of irregular combinations influences beauty evaluation for compositions with stochastic matrices. Research has shown that specific artistic competence influences the assessment of irregular or asymmetrical stimuli as beautiful. Our study, on the other hand, shows that irregular stochastic combinations are more beautiful for both art experts and non-experts.

Naïve Observers and Art Experts Rate Irregular Stochastic Pictures More Dynamic and Beautiful

perception can be affected by real emotional pictures of people that evoke different levels of arousal. Figurative artwork images of body postures that imply movement with different intensities and evoke different levels of arousal can modulate the perception of time. The present study investigated whether abstract paintings that represent motion in different ways affect the perception of time when subjects are exposed to the paintings for different durations. Undergraduate students observed 20 abstract paintings from different artistic schools (i.e., cubism, constructivism, expressionism, and futurism). They observed for 3 s each painting and estimated the time of exposure (reproduction method). After the time estimations, the subjects completed different semantic Movement, Arousal, Complexity, and Recognition scales to obtain information about how the painting compositions were perceived. Time distortions were observed for only two cubist paintings that represented human forms, which were related to both evoked arousal and implied movement (Experiment 1). Experiment 2 further verified whether these time distortions were related to implied movement perception or arousal. Different groups of participants were exposed for 3 and 9 s to only four cubist paintings that represented human forms. These time exposures (3 and 9 s) were used because the arousal-evoking effects may be transient for exposure times that are longer than 2-3 s. The data analysis revealed overestimation of time for the cubist painting that had greater arousal and movement scores only when the subjects were exposed for 9 s, showing that implied movement in abstract human figures is more effective than images with emotional content. We discuss the effect of durations of exposure to pictorial characteristics of artwork on time perception, emphasizing aspects of the visual perception of human forms in cubist paintings and arousal effects in an aesthetic episode. Keywords: time perception, static images, implied movement, cubism, arousal.

/pdf/subjective-time-perception-is-affected-by-different-1lhku2hxkl.pdf

Subjective time perception is affected by different durations of exposure to abstract paintings that represent human movement

Visual perception is adapted toward a better understanding of our own movements than those of non-conspecifics. The present study determined whether time perception is affected by pictures of different species by considering the evolutionary scale. Static (“S”) and implied movement (“M”) images of a dog, cheetah, chimpanzee, and man were presented to undergraduate students. S and M images of the same species were presented in random order or one after the other (S-M or M-S) for two groups of participants. Movement, Velocity, and Arousal semantic scales were used to characterize some properties of the images. Implied movement affected time perception, in which M images were overestimated. The results are discussed in terms of visual motion perception related to biological timing processing that could be established early in terms of the adaptation of humankind to the environment.

/pdf/implied-movement-in-static-images-reveals-biological-timing-3ys8ybwj36.pdf

Implied Movement in Static Images Reveals Biological Timing Processing

/pdf/movimiento-implicito-en-imagenes-estaticas-revelo-un-27uek7sgz4.pdf

Movimiento Implícito en Imágenes Estáticas Revelo un Procesamiento Biológico de lo Tiempo

/pdf/movimento-implicito-em-imagens-estaticas-revelou-um-466u7jmaho.pdf

Francisco Carlos Nather

Papers

Subjective time perception is affected by different durations of exposure to abstract paintings that represent human movement

Implied Movement in Static Images Reveals Biological Timing Processing

Movimiento Implícito en Imágenes Estáticas Revelo un Procesamiento Biológico de lo Tiempo

Movimento Implícito em Imagens Estáticas Revelou um Processamento Biológico do Tempo