Last Updated on October 3, 2023 by Editorial Team
The reason you are able to see these letters, separate one word from another, and understand the complete sentence is because of your ability of visual perception.
Visual perception takes place when the eyes and the nervous system, most importantly the brain, come together to perceive, process, and interpret what one is seeing. As studies have found, the brain actively works to give meaning to whatever the eyes see and decides the further courses of action based on visual perception[1].
Some studies have found lacunae in visual perception abilities to be the cause behind cognitive deficits that take place in dyslexia and dyscalculia[2]. They have also shown that working on improving visual perception skills can help in improving work recognition, reading, and comprehension[3]. Other studies have strongly contended this assertion, showing that deficits in visual perception are not responsible for any kind of difficulties with reading and comprehension[4].
Examples of Visual Perception
Visual perception becomes an essential skill, unknowingly or knowingly aiding and abetting us in everything, from the most mundane of tasks to the more complex ones. We can find various examples of the same in our daily routine right from when we wake up.
1. Putting on shoes and slippers
The reason we know to put on the right slipper on the right foot and the left slipper on our left foot is because we can visually perceive, process, recall, and differentiate between the left and the right slippers.
2. Dressing ourselves
Then when we go to dress, it is the visual memory, built out of all our visual perceptions, that helps us find socks, gloves, and shoes of matching color.
3. Driving and road signs
When a person is driving, it is the same visual memory that helps them remember that a big red sign with a white horizontal line means “Do not stop”. It is also a visual perception that helps them see there might be a school or a zebra crossing ahead which means that they need to slow down.
Visual perception helps with spatial relations and problem-solving. This is how a person is able to pick out the shortest route to their destination. This is also how a person can tell who is standing closer to them.
4. Going to home, office, and school
It is visual discrimination, a skill developed from repeated use of visual perception in the environment, that helps people perceive and distinguish between their own house, office, and school from all the other buildings nearby.
5. Meeting people
Once we enter the building, it is the exact same process that helps us recognize and differentiate the people and faces we know and are friends with from the ones we don’t know.
6. Recognizing them even when upside down
Visual perception helps in maintaining size and form constancy which is the understanding that even if a person or an object might appear different from a certain angle or distance, they still have the same size and form. If a child looks at their mother upside down, it is form constancy that will help them recognize their mother even from that or any other angle.
7. Learning the alphabets
Visual sequential memory, or remembering the correct sequence of various visual perceptions, helps us not only perceive the letters “b, c, a” but also remember that their correct order in the alphabet is “a, b, c.”
8. Studying in the class
Students are able to pay attention to the board while the teacher is writing because they are able to block out the visual perception of every other thing in the class, like pictures, charts, bulletin boards, other students, etc. Subsequently, they are able to make notes because they can perceive and then understand what is written on the board.
9. Reading and solving puzzles
Visual discrimination also helps in solving problems like “finding the difference”. While reading, it helps in distinguishing between similar-looking letters like “p” and “q” and “b” and “d” and even numbers like “9” and “6”.
If you go to the zoo, you will need visual discrimination to be able to differentiate between a deer and a giraffe.
10. Drawing and painting
While drawing and coloring, children remember to color the clouds blue and the sun yellow-ish orange because they have visually perceived that to be the color of the sun and clouds in real life and in other pictures. They were able to remember those perceptions and recall them successfully while drawing because of visual memory.
The reason why people can do crossword puzzles, solve jumbled sentences, and fill in the blanks when there is a missing letter or a word is in part because of their visual perceptual skills.
What does it mean when you have a high visual perception?
It was when people tried to code computers to understand the 3-D world that they realized what a marvel our visual perception is. It is easily able to perceive objects, with all their colors, forms, and sizes, in three dimensions in the blink of an eye.
This highly complex process of visually absorbing, remembering, and understanding everything happens automatically, almost without a single thought. Some visual perception skills are present at birth, but some higher-order skills develop as the child grows. Visual perception plays an important role in the child’s cognitive, social, and physical development.
Many studies have shown the importance of vision in a child’s understanding and participation in social interactions[5]. Infants notice the facial expressions on their parent’s or caregivers’ faces and can distinguish between happy and sad by the time they are a few months old. Infants start to pay attention to faces, objects, and sometimes even something that adults pay attention to by the time they are six to seven months old[6].
Research has illustrated that visual perception skills play an important role in tasks such as paying attention and learning[7]. Moreover, they have also shown that underdeveloped visual perception skills can result in difficulties with reading, handwriting, and visual motor integration[8], spelling[9], and even mathematics[10].
Not to say that with the capacity to see or visually perceive, the person will be able to perform certain tasks. But, learning how to do the same might be a harder and longer process for the individual.
Vision is one of the basic senses. It is important to understand the reasons behind one’s impaired visual perception and seek treatment for the same, if possible. If the reason is as simple as myopia, a simple prescription of glasses can restore vision, taking away any hindrances to visual perception.
Our brain is like a muscle that can be strengthened with exercise and practice to perform certain tasks. This feature of the brain is known as neuroplasticity[11]. This feature of the brain can be used to enhance visual perception skills. There are various fun ways in which both children and adults can improve their visual perception skills, more specifically, their visual discrimination and visual closure skills.
Conclusion
Visual perception is a complex, often taken-for-granted cognitive task that our eyes and brain perform automatically. We use various visual perception skills in our daily lives in almost everything we do. While underdeveloped visual perception skills can lead to many other difficulties, it is possible to improve one’s visual perception skills using various tools, games, and activities.
References
- Gregory, R. L. (1970). The intelligent eye.
- Cheng, D., Xiao, Q., Chen, Q., Cui, J., & Zhou, X. (2018). Dyslexia and dyscalculia are characterized by common visual perception deficits. Developmental neuropsychology, 43(6), 497-507.
- Same, S. K. L., Alizadeh, H., & Koushesh, M. (2009). The impact of visual perception skills training on reading performance in students with dyslexia.
- Shovman, M. M., & Ahissar, M. (2006). Isolating the impact of visual perception on dyslexics’ reading ability. Vision Research, 46(20), 3514-3525.
- Tröster, H., & Brambring, M. (1992). Early social‐emotional development in blind infants. Child: Care, health and development, 18(4), 207-227.
- Ruba, A. L., & Repacholi, B. M. (2020). Do preverbal infants understand discrete facial expressions of emotion?. Emotion Review, 12(4), 235-250.
- Yin, S. H., Park, M. H., Hwang, M. K., Nam, G. Y., & Kwon, M. W. (2019). A study on the visual perception of characters using eye tracking. The Journal of the Korea Contents Association, 19(6), 105-113.
- Çayir, A. (2017). Analyzing the Reading Skills and Visual Perception Levels of First Grade Students. Universal Journal of Educational Research, 5(7), 1113-1116.
- Gates, A. I. (1926). A study of the rôle of visual perception, intelligence, and certain associative processes in reading and spelling. Journal of Educational Psychology, 17(7), 433–445. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0072810
- Cui, J., Zhang, Y., Cheng, D., Li, D., & Zhou, X. (2017). Visual form perception can be a cognitive correlate of lower level math categories for teenagers. Frontiers in Psychology, 8, 1336.
- Konorski, J. (1948). Conditioned reflexes and neuron organization.
An engineer, Maths expert, Online Tutor and animal rights activist. In more than 5+ years of my online teaching experience, I closely worked with many students struggling with dyscalculia and dyslexia. With the years passing, I learned that not much effort being put into the awareness of this learning disorder. Students with dyscalculia often misunderstood for having just a simple math fear. This is still an underresearched and understudied subject. I am also the founder of Smartynote -‘The notepad app for dyslexia’,