What does the nature of the stimuli tell us about the Global Precedence Effect?

Gender differences in global-local perception? Evidence from orientation and shape judgments

Direct examinations of gender differences in global-local processing are sparse, and the results are inconsistent. We examined this issue with a visuospatial judgment task and with a shape judgment task. Women and men were presented with hierarchical stimuli that varied in closure (open or closed shape) or in line orientation (oblique or horizontal/vertical) at the global or local level. The task was to classify the stimuli on the basis of the variation at the global level (global classification) or at the local level (local classification). Women's classification by closure (global or local) was more accurate than men's for stimuli that varied in closure on both levels, suggesting a female advantage in discriminating shape properties. No gender differences were observed in global-local processing bias. Women and men exhibited a global advantage, and they did not differ in their speed of global or local classification, with only one exception. Women were slower than men in local classification by orientation when the to-be-classified lines were embedded in a global line with a different orientation. This finding suggests that women are more distracted than men by misleading global oriented context when performing local orientation judgments, perhaps because women and men differ in their ability to use cognitive schemes to compensate for the distracting effects of the global context. Our findings further suggest that whether or not gender differences arise depends not only on the nature of the visual task but also on the visual context.

Seeing the Forest Before the Trees Depends on Individual Field-Dependency Characteristics

Numerous studies have demonstrated that the well-known global precedence effect, characterized by a visual bias toward global information, is highly dependent on stimulus characteristics ( Kimchi, 1992 ). Despite the extensive global-local literature, few studies have investigated how interindividual characteristics could affect the global precedence effect. In this framework, we studied the relationship between global-local visual biases and the Group Embedded Figure Test (GEFT), a standardized measure of field dependency. Data from 34 participants were consistent with the idea that an individual’s bias toward the global level is linearly related to his or her degree of field dependence. Given the important role that global-local visual skills play during visuospatial tasks, these results have important implications for future research in this area.