Asymmetric identification of parafoveal stimulus pairs: Feature perturbations or failure in feature extraction?

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Abstract
The peripheral member of a parafoveally presented figure pair is more accurately identified than the central member. Explanations involving feature extraction were contrasted in 3 experiments. In the 1st experiment, subjects identified letter pairs deliberately combined to encourage certain perturbations. Feature extraction failure better explained the identification asymmetry than did feature perturbations. In the 2nd experiment, a different group of subjects identified the position of a gap in a circle flanked centrally or peripherally by a disk. Since a disk apparently does not have different features susceptible to perturbation to cover the gap, the asymmetry observed is not easily explained in terms of feature perturbations. In the final experiment, another group of subjects identified the position of a gap in a circle flanked centrally or peripherally by either 1 or 2 ungapped circles. Two ungapped peripheral circles allowed better identification accuracy than 1. Apparently, feature extraction is concentrated on the most peripheral figure, producing inhibition of extraction for more central figures which decreases with distance.

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