J Wagemans
Datos Biográficos
| ID | 48900 |
|---|---|
| NOMBRE | J Wagemans |
| NOMBRES | J |
| APELLIDO | Wagemans |
| FIRMA | WAGEMANS J |
| AFILIACIONES | KU Leuven |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-7970-1541 |
| VERIFICADO | Sí |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 33 |
| TOTAL DE CITAS | 90 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 32 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 1 |
| PRIMER AÑO DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2010 |
| AÑO MÁS RECIENTE DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 3 |
Cognition outstanding reviewer awards - 2025
The Multifaceted Ganzfeld at the Crossroad Between Visual Perception and Consciousness
A Ganzfeld is a homogeneous visual field, devoid of any focal points. Such a stimulus has been used by researchers to study perceptual phenomena in the absence of changes in sensory structure. Others have used it to study altered states of consciousness (ASCs). Until now, these different facets have been studied separately with little attention for the emotional subjective experience. This study aimed to elucidate the perceptual, phenomenal, and …
A systematic approach to study preferences for complexity at different levels of order
sponsorship: This work has been supported by a PhD fellowship and a junior postdoctoral fellowship from the Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO), both awarded to Eline Van Geert (Grants 11D3621N and 1244825N), and by a long-term structural funding from the Flemish Government awarded to Johan Wagemans (METH/21/02). The data, materials, and analysis code for the experiment are available as the additional online materials on the Open Science Framework…
A time and a place for art perception
Most empirical aesthetics research strips away the environments and experiences that art viewers commonly enjoy. These restrictions can be important to study specific aesthetic features (e.g., symmetry and contrast), but experimental limitations may inhibit viewers' ability to engage with artworks on a deeper level. We sought to explore how a typical experimental design impacts the art-viewing experience, in comparison to a museum visit. We focus…
Leuven Orthogonalized Art Data Set (Load)
sponsorship: This research was funded in whole, or in part, by the Horizon Europe Framework Programme (Grant 101053925). For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a CC BY public copyright license to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising from this submission.The research was funded by the Excellence of Science Program (Grant HUMVISCAT), Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek-Vlaanderen (FWO Flanders, Grant G0D3322N), and by the Eur…
Filling in the blanks of Ganzfeld art
sponsorship: This project is supported by long-term structural funding by the Flemish government (Grant METH/21/02) awarded to Johan Wagemans. We thankZLDR Luchtfabriek for their cooperation with this project, allowing us to col-lect data in the Ganzfeld art installation. (Flemish government|METH/21/02)
Art has no gender, only gender bias
The current study investigated whether gender could be distinguished in a set of Abstract Expressionist paintings (N = 160) by an equal number of female (Krasner, Frankenthaler, Mitchell, Hartigan) and male (Pollock, Louis, Twombly, Kline) artists. The study consisted of three experiments and was performed by three separate groups of participants (total N = 800). In Experiment 1, participants judged whether the artwork was painted by a female or …
Understanding Navon
When perceiving visual information, either the local parts or more commonly the global whole can dominate on a perceptual-cognitive level (local/global bias). Using hierarchical figures consisting of smaller local elements forming a larger global shape, researchers have tried to understand how this local–global bias emerges. However, despite extensive research, local–global biases remain an elusive concept (possibly partially due to inadequacies …
Photographs that repulse or entice
sponsorship: We would like to thank the photographers for their positive response toour inquiry for studying and reproducing their photographs in this article.Would like to thank Christophe Bossens for programming the experiment.Our thanks go out to Marie Bertels for assisting with practical aspects of thestudy and collecting data. This work has been supported by long-term structural funding from the Flemish Government awarded to Johan Wagemans(M…
Presenting TaMuNaBe
In order to accurately study in situ aesthetic responses as participants explore gallery spaces and museum exhibitions, we need a way to comprehensively, exhaustively, and precisely classify the behaviours displayed in such settings. We have restructured and extended a preliminary taxonomy of museum navigation behaviour to give it a hierarchical structure and precise behavioural criteria. Our taxonomy features categories for both art related and …
Prägnanz in visual perception
How do we perceptually and cognitively organize incoming stimulation? A century ago, Gestalt psychologists posited the law of Prägnanz: psychological organization will always be as ‘good’ as possible given the prevailing conditions. To make the Prägnanz law a useful statement, it needs to be specified further (a) what a ‘good’ psychological organization entails, (b) how the Prägnanz tendency can be realized, and (c) which conditions need to be ta…
Finding the meaning in meaning maps
Unveiling the factors of aesthetic preferences with explainable AI
The allure of aesthetic appeal in images captivates our senses, yet the underlying intricacies of aesthetic preferences remain elusive. In this study, we pioneer a novel perspective by utilizing several different machine learning (ML) models that focus on aesthetic attributes known to influence preferences. Our models process these attributes as inputs to predict the aesthetic scores of images. Moreover, to delve deeper and obtain interpretable e…
Beyond the single picture
sponsorship: We thank the members of photography organization Unexposed and all photographers from the PhotoTWENS 2019 exhibition for their collaboration in this project. We are also grateful to all volunteering visitors for providing us with valuable insights into their aesthetic experiences. Finally, we also thank Christie Kemp and Chris Linden for their assistance in the data collection. We have no known conflict of interest to disclose. This …
The role of local and global symmetry in pleasure, interest, and complexity judgments of natural scenes
sponsorship: This work was supported by an NSERC Discovery Grant (RGPIN-2015-06696) awarded to Dirk B. Walther. Johan Wagemans is funded by a longterm structural grant from the Flemish Government (METH/14/02). (NSERC Discovery Grant|RGPIN-2015-06696, Flemish Government|METH/14/02)
Processing fluency, processing style, and aesthetic response to artistic photographs
sponsorship: Johan Wagemans https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7970-1541 We thank the photographers for their positive response to our inquiry for studying and reproducing their photographs in this article. We would like to thank Christophe Bossens for programming the experiment and Marie Bertels for assisting with practical aspects of setting up the study and collecting data. We thank Steven Verheyen for setting up and collecting the data for Study 3 (…
Perceptual grouping in complex rhythmic patterns
What ugly and beautiful photographs reveal about Covid-19 lockdown experiences, everyday aesthetics and photography aesthetics
Against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, which restricted our daily (visual) experiences, we asked people to take an ugly and beautiful photograph from within their homes. In total, 284 photographs (142 ugly and 142 beautiful) and accompanying statements were submitted and brought to light an intimate portrait of how participants were experiencing their (lockdown) home environment. Results revealed an aesthetic preference for (living) natur…
Learning to see by learning to draw
A growing body of correlational research has revealed systematic relationships between various aspects of visuospatial processing and representational drawing ability. However, very few studies have sought to examine the longitudinal development of the relation between drawing and visuospatial ability. The current investigation explored change in drawing and visuospatial skill in art students taking a foundational drawing course (n = 42) in a lon…
Order, complexity, and aesthetic preferences for neatly organized compositions
Which factors can predict aesthetic preferences for images of neatly organized compositions, collected on blogs like Things Organized Neatly© (http://thingsorganizedneatly.tumblr.com/)? We focused on stimulus and person properties related to order, complexity, and the balance between order and complexity. Participants (N = 415) indicated their preference for one of two simultaneously presented images (100 pairs) and completed some personality que…
Visual affects
Order, complexity, and aesthetic appreciation
Which stimulus and person characteristics determine aesthetic appreciation? For many centuries, philosophers and scientists have been trying to solve this complex puzzle. Through the ages, order, complexity, and the balance between order and complexity have frequently been considered as an answer to this question. The literature on the topic, however, both theoretically and empirically speaking, is rather diffuse and contradictory. In this review…
The relationship between gaze behavior, expertise, and performance
Beauty in the blink of an eye
Under normal circumstances, perception runs very fast and seemingly automatic. In just a few ms, we go from sensory features to perceiving objects. This fast time course does not only apply to general perceptual aspects but also to what we call higher‐level judgements. Inspired by the study on ‘very first impressions’ by Bar, Neta, and Linz (2006, Emotion , 6 , 269) the current research examined the speed and time course of three aspects of the a…
Perceptual flexibility is coupled with reduced executive inhibition in students of the visual arts
Artists often report that seeing familiar stimuli in novel and interesting ways plays a role in visual art creation. However, the attentional mechanisms which underpin this ability have yet to be fully investigated. More specifically, it is unclear whether the ability to reinterpret visual stimuli in novel and interesting ways is facilitated by endogenously generated switches of attention, and whether it is linked in turn to executive functions s…
A century of Gestalt psychology in visual perception
In 1912, Max Wertheimer published his paper on phi motion, widely recognized as the start of Gestalt psychology. Because of its continued relevance in modern psychology, this centennial anniversary is an excellent opportunity to take stock of what Gestalt psychology has offered and how it has changed since its inception. We first introduce the key findings and ideas in the Berlin school of Gestalt psychology, and then briefly sketch its developme…
A century of Gestalt psychology in visual perception
Our first review article (Wagemans et al., 2012) on the occasion of the centennial anniversary of Gestalt psychology focused on perceptual grouping and figure-ground organization. It concluded that further progress requires a reconsideration of the conceptual and theoretical foundations of the Gestalt approach, which is provided here. In particular, we review contemporary formulations of holism within an information-processing framework, allowing…
Precise minds in uncertain worlds
There have been numerous attempts to explain the enigma of autism, but existing neurocognitive theories often provide merely a refined description of 1 cluster of symptoms.Here we argue that deficits in executive functioning, theory of mind, and central coherence can all be understood as the consequence of a core deficit in the flexibility with which people with autism spectrum disorder can process violations to their expectations.More formally w…
What ugly and beautiful photographs reveal about Covid-19 lockdown experiences, everyday aesthetics and photography aesthetics
Against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, which restricted our daily (visual) experiences, we asked people to take an ugly and beautiful photograph from within their homes. In total, 284 photographs (142 ugly and 142 beautiful) and accompanying statements were submitted and brought to light an intimate portrait of how participants were experiencing their (lockdown) home environment. Results revealed an aesthetic preference for (living) natur…
Image descriptions in early and mid-level vision
In The utility of image descriptions in the initial stages of vision: A case study of printed text, Watt and Dakin (2010) describe a model that integrates mechanisms at both early and middle stages of visual processing, and provide a demonstration of the application of the model to the relational organization of printed text. In the following, we discuss a number of the merits of this approach, but argue that it is (at this stage) highly difficul…
Perceptual flexibility is coupled with reduced executive inhibition in students of the visual arts
Artists often report that seeing familiar stimuli in novel and interesting ways plays a role in visual art creation. However, the attentional mechanisms which underpin this ability have yet to be fully investigated. More specifically, it is unclear whether the ability to reinterpret visual stimuli in novel and interesting ways is facilitated by endogenously generated switches of attention, and whether it is linked in turn to executive functions s…
Image descriptions in early and mid-level vision
In The utility of image descriptions in the initial stages of vision: A case study of printed text, Watt and Dakin (2010) describe a model that integrates mechanisms at both early and middle stages of visual processing, and provide a demonstration of the application of the model to the relational organization of printed text. In the following, we discuss a number of the merits of this approach, but argue that it is (at this stage) highly difficul…
What is required for a signal to be qualified as a ‘grouping’ tag
In our commentary paper (Dry, Kogo, Putzeys, & Wagemans, 2010) on 'The utility of image descriptions in the initial stages of vision: a case study of printed text' (Watt & Dakin, 2010a), we raised a few concerns about the approach to perceptual grouping proposed by Watt and Dakin. Specifically, we argued that the 'overlap tokens' resulting from convolution with Gabor filters do not reflect the global configuration of the image and hence that they…
A century of Gestalt psychology in visual perception
Our first review article (Wagemans et al., 2012) on the occasion of the centennial anniversary of Gestalt psychology focused on perceptual grouping and figure-ground organization. It concluded that further progress requires a reconsideration of the conceptual and theoretical foundations of the Gestalt approach, which is provided here. In particular, we review contemporary formulations of holism within an information-processing framework, allowing…
A century of Gestalt psychology in visual perception
In 1912, Max Wertheimer published his paper on phi motion, widely recognized as the start of Gestalt psychology. Because of its continued relevance in modern psychology, this centennial anniversary is an excellent opportunity to take stock of what Gestalt psychology has offered and how it has changed since its inception. We first introduce the key findings and ideas in the Berlin school of Gestalt psychology, and then briefly sketch its developme…
Precise minds in uncertain worlds
There have been numerous attempts to explain the enigma of autism, but existing neurocognitive theories often provide merely a refined description of 1 cluster of symptoms.Here we argue that deficits in executive functioning, theory of mind, and central coherence can all be understood as the consequence of a core deficit in the flexibility with which people with autism spectrum disorder can process violations to their expectations.More formally w…
Vision, High-Level Theory of
The Oxford Handbook of Perceptual Organization
SECTION ONE: GENERAL BACKGROUND SECTION TWO: GROUPS, PATTERNS, TEXTURES SECTION THREE: CONTOURS AND SHAPES SECTION FOUR: FIGURE-GROUND ORGANIZATION SECTION FIVE: SURFACE AND COLOUR PERCEPTION SECTION SIX: MOTION AND EVENT PERCEPTION SECTION SEVEN: PERCEPTUAL ORGANIZATION AND OTHER MODALITIES SECTION EIGHT: SPECIAL INTEREST TOPICS SECTION NINE: APPLICATIONS OF PERCEPTUAL ORGANIZATION SECTION TEN: THEORETICAL APPROACHES
Global processing takes time
What does an individual with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) perceive first: the forest or the trees? In spite of 30 years of research and influential theories like the weak central coherence (WCC) theory and the enhanced perceptual functioning (EPF) account, the interplay of local and global visual processing in ASD remains only partly understood. Research findings vary in indicating a local processing bias or a global processing deficit, and oft…
Beauty in the blink of an eye
Under normal circumstances, perception runs very fast and seemingly automatic. In just a few ms, we go from sensory features to perceiving objects. This fast time course does not only apply to general perceptual aspects but also to what we call higher‐level judgements. Inspired by the study on ‘very first impressions’ by Bar, Neta, and Linz (2006, Emotion , 6 , 269) the current research examined the speed and time course of three aspects of the a…
Perceptual flexibility is coupled with reduced executive inhibition in students of the visual arts
Artists often report that seeing familiar stimuli in novel and interesting ways plays a role in visual art creation. However, the attentional mechanisms which underpin this ability have yet to be fully investigated. More specifically, it is unclear whether the ability to reinterpret visual stimuli in novel and interesting ways is facilitated by endogenously generated switches of attention, and whether it is linked in turn to executive functions s…
The relationship between gaze behavior, expertise, and performance
Order, complexity, and aesthetic appreciation
Which stimulus and person characteristics determine aesthetic appreciation? For many centuries, philosophers and scientists have been trying to solve this complex puzzle. Through the ages, order, complexity, and the balance between order and complexity have frequently been considered as an answer to this question. The literature on the topic, however, both theoretically and empirically speaking, is rather diffuse and contradictory. In this review…
Learning to see by learning to draw
A growing body of correlational research has revealed systematic relationships between various aspects of visuospatial processing and representational drawing ability. However, very few studies have sought to examine the longitudinal development of the relation between drawing and visuospatial ability. The current investigation explored change in drawing and visuospatial skill in art students taking a foundational drawing course (n = 42) in a lon…
Order, complexity, and aesthetic preferences for neatly organized compositions
Which factors can predict aesthetic preferences for images of neatly organized compositions, collected on blogs like Things Organized Neatly© (http://thingsorganizedneatly.tumblr.com/)? We focused on stimulus and person properties related to order, complexity, and the balance between order and complexity. Participants (N = 415) indicated their preference for one of two simultaneously presented images (100 pairs) and completed some personality que…
Visual affects
Beyond the single picture
sponsorship: We thank the members of photography organization Unexposed and all photographers from the PhotoTWENS 2019 exhibition for their collaboration in this project. We are also grateful to all volunteering visitors for providing us with valuable insights into their aesthetic experiences. Finally, we also thank Christie Kemp and Chris Linden for their assistance in the data collection. We have no known conflict of interest to disclose. This …
The role of local and global symmetry in pleasure, interest, and complexity judgments of natural scenes
sponsorship: This work was supported by an NSERC Discovery Grant (RGPIN-2015-06696) awarded to Dirk B. Walther. Johan Wagemans is funded by a longterm structural grant from the Flemish Government (METH/14/02). (NSERC Discovery Grant|RGPIN-2015-06696, Flemish Government|METH/14/02)
Processing fluency, processing style, and aesthetic response to artistic photographs
sponsorship: Johan Wagemans https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7970-1541 We thank the photographers for their positive response to our inquiry for studying and reproducing their photographs in this article. We would like to thank Christophe Bossens for programming the experiment and Marie Bertels for assisting with practical aspects of setting up the study and collecting data. We thank Steven Verheyen for setting up and collecting the data for Study 3 (…
Perceptual grouping in complex rhythmic patterns
What ugly and beautiful photographs reveal about Covid-19 lockdown experiences, everyday aesthetics and photography aesthetics
Against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, which restricted our daily (visual) experiences, we asked people to take an ugly and beautiful photograph from within their homes. In total, 284 photographs (142 ugly and 142 beautiful) and accompanying statements were submitted and brought to light an intimate portrait of how participants were experiencing their (lockdown) home environment. Results revealed an aesthetic preference for (living) natur…
Photographs that repulse or entice
sponsorship: We would like to thank the photographers for their positive response toour inquiry for studying and reproducing their photographs in this article.Would like to thank Christophe Bossens for programming the experiment.Our thanks go out to Marie Bertels for assisting with practical aspects of thestudy and collecting data. This work has been supported by long-term structural funding from the Flemish Government awarded to Johan Wagemans(M…
Presenting TaMuNaBe
In order to accurately study in situ aesthetic responses as participants explore gallery spaces and museum exhibitions, we need a way to comprehensively, exhaustively, and precisely classify the behaviours displayed in such settings. We have restructured and extended a preliminary taxonomy of museum navigation behaviour to give it a hierarchical structure and precise behavioural criteria. Our taxonomy features categories for both art related and …
Prägnanz in visual perception
How do we perceptually and cognitively organize incoming stimulation? A century ago, Gestalt psychologists posited the law of Prägnanz: psychological organization will always be as ‘good’ as possible given the prevailing conditions. To make the Prägnanz law a useful statement, it needs to be specified further (a) what a ‘good’ psychological organization entails, (b) how the Prägnanz tendency can be realized, and (c) which conditions need to be ta…
Finding the meaning in meaning maps
Unveiling the factors of aesthetic preferences with explainable AI
The allure of aesthetic appeal in images captivates our senses, yet the underlying intricacies of aesthetic preferences remain elusive. In this study, we pioneer a novel perspective by utilizing several different machine learning (ML) models that focus on aesthetic attributes known to influence preferences. Our models process these attributes as inputs to predict the aesthetic scores of images. Moreover, to delve deeper and obtain interpretable e…
Psychology (23 obras) · Cognitive psychology (16 obras) · Computer Science (14 obras) · Perception (13 obras) · Aesthetic Perception and Analysis (10 obras) · Neuroscience (10 obras) · Aesthetics (9 obras) · Art (9 obras) · Cognitive science (8 obras) · Visual perception and processing mechanisms (8 obras)