I am very excited to announce that over the holidays, my first ever paper (w/ @samiyousif.bsky.social) was published in Cognitive Science! Here, we describe a new illusion of *number*: The Crowd Size Illusion!
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
We think there are still some interesting questions here about what aspects of visual ensembles are prioritized, but, for the most part, we think there’s no clear and obvious reason to think that a visual number bias underlies the development of higher-order mathematical knowledge.
In a first set of experiments, borrowing an existing paradigm, we compared number against a new dimension – (average) size rather than (cumulative) area. We found that even though the dimensions were equally discriminable, participants overwhelmingly categorized using size.
We also used three other paradigms (matching, intruder, and outlier identification tasks) to test the relationship between the dimensions in various contexts. In each case, we found that average size, not number, was most salient.
One reason we care so much about this number bias is because it is the foundation for theoretically substantive claims. For instance, some have speculated that a number bias is indicative of phylogenetically ancient knowledge that led to the cultural development of abstract mathematics.
When you look at a complex scene, you perceive various ensembles — sets of items of various sizes, numbers, etc. Are some more salient than others? In a new paper (w/ samiyousif.bsky.social), we provide an answer to this question! osf.io/preprints/ps...
Gabe Waterhouse
Gabe Waterhouse
Previous work has demonstrated a “number bias”, where numerical information is prioritized over other dimensions like cumulative area. But is this always true? We wanted to see if this pattern held up in different paradigms, with unique stimuli, and in comparison to different dimensions.
What if we ask the same question but in a different way? In a novel paradigm, observers viewed an *entire stimulus space* at once and were asked to divide it into two distinct groups in whatever way they saw fit. Overall, they tended not to divide the space into low and high number.
Sadly I will not be at VSS this year, but here's what our lab is up to!
(In solidarity with many VSS attendees, however, I may be foregoing many hours of sleep -- not for long walks on the beach but due to the anticipated arrival of a second child any day now...)
Gabe Waterhouse
Gabe Waterhouse
Recently, (recommended) prices at @joinprolific.bsky.social have doubled. Simultaneously, data quality and collection speed seem to have gone down noticeably (especially speed). Are others having this experience?
These changes make the platform significantly less viable for our lab.
