| Summary: | Does visual search involve a serial inspection of individual display items (Feature
Integration Theory) or are there perceptual processes that group and segregate items from
one another prior to their consideration as a possible target (Resemblance Theory)? For
example, for targets defined by motion and shape, there is strong support for grouping
processes (Kingstone & Bischof, 1999). The present study looked for evidence of
grouping based on shape symmetry. Participants searched for target shapes among
distractors that were mirror images over either the vertical or horizontal axis. The results
indicated: (1) symmetry between items strongly influences search, (2) search was
influenced by grouping among target and distractor items in the display, and (3)
symmetry was influential in between-distractor grouping only when displays were
'cortically magnified' in order to equate the salience of symmetry across display
locations. These results confirm that static shapes are grouped on the basis of their
symmetrical similarity to one another, prior to their explicit identification as being either
'target' or 'distractor'. Thus, as with items in motion, static items are grouped and
segregated prior to consideration as a target, in accordance with Resemblance Theory.
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